On Friday, April 27, Gallery de Boer-Fine Art and co-sponsor Block and Stone Resource Group will host a reception to celebrate Luminosity, Chris Morton's current exhibition of outstanding landscape paintings.
This exhibition showcases 35 of Morton's light-filled, shimmering evocations of rural and cottage country scenes from around Ontario, including Grey County, Algonquin Park, and the Kawartha Highlands. The artist will be on hand to chat with visitors at the Friday reception from 6 to 10 pm, at which refreshments will also be served.
Morton will also be at the gallery the following day, Saturday, April 28, from 1 to 4 pm. An award-winning artist with a particular talent for depicting water and sunlight, Chris Morton's show is a must-see event for all who feel an affinity with our beautiful Ontario lakes, rivers and creeks.
Christopher Morton is a landscape and wildlife artist who has been painting and drawing since a very young age. In his favourite media of oil and acrylic, he creates detailed, atmospheric works inspired by rural and wilderness locations around Ontario. He credits distinguished artists George McLean and Dwayne Harty as having played key roles in the evolution of his art practice.
Originally from Owen Sound, Chris also spent time in Peterborough before returning to the city of his birth. These regions, as well as Algonquin Park, form the basis of many of Chris' images. Many of these images have won prizes, such as in the Chrysler Search for Canadian Wildlife Artists (1985) and the Paint Ontario Juried Art Show (2016 and 2017). His work has also been reproduced in a number of calendars and in limited editions.
In 2003, Chris was chosen by the Ontario Federation of Hunters and Anglers as their Conservation Artist of the Year, and in the same year the Canadian National Sport Fishing Foundation commissioned him to create an image to promote fishing as part of Canadians' heritage. Also in 2003 he was Resident Artist at the Algonquin Park Visitor Centre.
Some of Chris' notable exhibition experience includes a long relationship with the Buckhorn Fine Art Festival, and he was recently featured in the Tom Thomson Gallery's presentation Tom and Rob's Excellent Adventure II. The International Gallery of the Arts recognized his work in 2016 with a position in the Gallery's "Two Person Spotlight". This included a 10-page spread in their National Art Magazine.
Chris continues to work on independent pieces as well as private commissions. In May of 2017 he will have an exhibition at the Niagara Pumphouse Gallery in Niagara-on-the-Lake, followed by the Leamington Art Centre near Windsor in July.
Luminosity is on at Gallery de Boer-Fine Art, 969 Second Avenue E., 2nd Floor. For more information call 519-376-7914 or go to www.gallerydeboer.ca.
