Canadian Art

Canadian art refers to the visual (including painting, photography, and printmaking) as well as plastic arts (such as sculpture) originating from the geographical area of contemporary Canada. Art in Canada is marked by thousands of years of habitation by First Nations Peoples followed by waves of immigration which included artists of European origins and subsequently by artists with heritage from countries all around the world. The nature of Canadian art reflects these diverse origins, as artists have taken their traditions and adapted these influences to reflect the reality of their lives in Canada.

The Government of Canada has, at times, played a central role in the development of Canadian culture, enabling visual exposure through publications and periodicals, as well as establishing and funding numerous art schools and colleges across the country. The Group of Seven is often considered the first uniquely Canadian artistic group and style of painting; however, this claim is challenged by some scholars and artists. Historically the Catholic Church was the primary patron of art in early Canada, especially Quebec, and in later times artists have combined British, French and American artistic traditions, at times embracing European styles and at other times working to promote nationalism by developing distinctly Canadian styles. Canadian art remains the combination of these various influences.

Aboriginal peoples were producing art in the territory that is now called Canada for thousands of years prior to the arrival of European settler colonists and the eventual establishment of Canada as a nation state. Like the peoples that produced them, Indigenous art traditions spanned territories that extended across the current national boundaries between Canada and the United States. Indigenous art traditions are often organized by art historians according to cultural, linguistic or regional groups, the most common regional distinctions being: Northwest Coast, Northwest Plateau, Plains, Eastern Woodlands, Subarctic, and Arctic. As might be expected, art traditions vary enormously amongst and within these diverse groups. One thing that distinguishes Indigenous art from European traditions is a focus on art that tends to be portable and made for the body rather than for architecture, although even this is only a general tendency and not an absolute rule. Indigenous visual art is also often made to be used in conjunction with other arts, for example masks and rattles play an important role in ceremonialism that also involves dance, storytelling and music.

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