Red is Beautiful
Celebrating 50 years of artmaking, here’s a sneak peek of the Robert Houle retrospective coming this winter.
Robert Houle. Red is Beautiful, 1970. Acrylic on canvas, 45.5 x 61 cm. Musée canadien de l’histoire / Canadian Museum of History, V-F-174. © Robert Houle
Since the 1970s, contemporary Anishinaabe artist Robert Houle has been actively changing the way we see contemporary Indigenous art. A pivotal figure, his presence is felt every day at the AGO – his storied installation Seven Grandfathers (2014) hangs in Walker Court, and visitors to the J.S. McLean Centre for Indigenous & Canadian Art will immediately recognize his work Premises for Self-Rule: Constitution Act (1982) and the triptych The Pines (2002–2004). So how exciting to present at the AGO a major career retrospective of his work – Robert Houle: Red is Beautiful, opening December 3.
Bringing to the Sam & Ayala Zacks Pavilion more than 100 artworks made between 1970 and 2021, including large-scale installations, monumental paintings and drawings, the exhibition reflects on topics including nuclear fallout, residential schools, Indigenous sovereignty and the birth of Canada.
We will share more exciting details about this exhibition in the weeks to come. In the meantime, feast your eyes on some of these fantastic artworks coming soon to the AGO.
Robert Houle: Red is Beautiful is organized by the AGO and curated by Wanda Nanibush.
