Visibly Canadian: Imaging Collective Identities in the Canadas, 1820-1910

485 Pages·2015·50.864 MB·English

by  Karen Stanworth

Z Visibly Canadian Y
McGILL-QUEEN’S/BEAVERBROOK CANADIAN FOUNDATION
STUDIES IN ART HISTORY
Martha Langford and Sandra Paikowsky, series editors
Recognizing the need for a better understanding of Canada’s artistic culture both
at home and abroad, the Beaverbrook Canadian Foundation, through its generous
support, makes possible the publication of innovative books that advance our under-
standing of Canadian art and Canada’s visual and material culture. This series sup-
ports and stimulates such scholarship through the publication of original and rigorous
peer-reviewed books that make significant contributions to the subject. We welcome
submissions from Canadian and international scholars for book-length projects on
historical and contemporary Canadian art and visual and material culture, includ-
ing Native and Inuit art, architecture, photography, craft, design, and museum studies.
Studies by Canadian scholars on non-Canadian themes will also be considered.
The Practice of Her Profession
Florence Carlyle, Canadian Painter in the Age of Impressionism
Susan Butlin
Bringing Art to Life
A Biography of Alan Jarvis
Andrew Horrall
Picturing the Land
Narrating Territories in Canadian Landscape Art, 1500 to 1950
Marylin J. McKay
The Cultural Work of Photography in Canada
Edited by Carol Payne and Andrea Kunard
Newfoundland Modern
Architecture in the Smallwood Years, 1949–1972
Robert Mellin
The Codex Canadensis and the Writings of Louis Nicolas
The Natural History of the New World, Histoire Naturelle des Indes Occidentales
Edited and with an Introduction by François-Marc Gagnon, Translation by Nancy
Senior, Modernization by Réal Ouellet
Museum Pieces
Toward the Indigenization of Canadian Museums
Ruth B. Phillips
The Allied Arts
Architecture and Craft in Postwar Canada
Sandra Alfoldy
Rethinking Professionalism
Essays on Women and Art in Canada, 1850–1970
Edited by Kristina Huneault and Janice Anderson
The Official Picture
The National Film Board of Canada’s Still Photography Division and the Image of
Canada, 1941–1971
Carol Payne
Paul-Émile Borduas
A Critical Biography
François-Marc Gagnon
Translated by Peter Feldstein
On Architecture
Melvin Charney: A Critical Anthology
Edited by Louis Martin
Making Toronto Modern
Architecture and Design, 1895–1975
Christopher Armstrong
Negotiations in a Vacant Lot
Studying the Visual in Canada
Edited by Lynda Jessup, Erin Morton, and Kirsty Robertson
Visibly Canadian
Imaging Collective Identities in the Canadas, 1820–1910
Karen Stanworth

#
VISIBLY CANADIAN
Imaging Collective Identities in
the Canadas, 1820–1910
$
Karen Stanworth
McGill-Queen’s University Press
Montreal & Kingston | London | Ithaca
© McGill-Queen’s University Press 2014
isbn 978-0-7735-4458-1 (cloth)
isbn 978-0-7735-9693-1 (epdf)
Legal deposit fourth quarter 2014
Bibliothèque nationale du Québec
Printed in Canada on acid-free paper
Publication of this book has been aided by a grant from the Wyeth Foundation
for American Art Publication Fund of the College Art Association.
McGill-Queen’s University Press acknowledges the support of the Canada
Council for the Arts for our publishing program. We also acknowledge the
financial support of the Government of Canada through the Canada Book Fund
for our publishing activities.
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Stanworth, Karen, 1955–, author
Visibly Canadian : imaging collective identities in the Canadas, 1820–1910 /
Karen Stanworth.
(McGill-Queen’s/Beaverbrook Canadian Foundation studies in art history ; 15)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Issued in print and electronic formats.
isbn 978-0-7735-4458-1 (bound). – isbn 978-0-7735-9693-1 (epdf)
1. Art and society – Québec (Province) – History – 19th century – Case studies.
2. Art and society – Ontario – History – 19th century – Case studies.
3. Popular culture – Québec (Province) – History – 19th century – Case
studies. 4. Popular culture – Ontario – History – 19th century – Case studies.
5. Group identity – Québec (Province) – History – 19th century – Case
studies. 6. Group identity – Ontario – History – 19th century – Case studies.
7. Québec (Province) – Social life and customs – 19th century – Case studies.
8. Ontario – Social life and customs – 19th century – Case studies. I. Title.
II. Series: McGill-Queen’s/Beaverbrook Canadian Foundation studies in art
history ; 15
n72.s6s73 2014 701’.030971309034 C2014-905366-5
C2014-905367-3
Set in 11.5/14 Filosofia with Hypatia Sans Pro and Bergamot Ornaments
Book design and typesetting by Garet Markvoort, zijn digital
CONTENTS
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Acknowledgments ix
Colour plates follow page 22
Introduction: Visual Culture: Practices
and Methodologies 3
Part one
Visibly Ordered: Mid-Nineteenth-Century Museums
and the Colonial Order of Things 23
1 A Picture of Quebec:
Artifacts of Civilization 31
2 A Laboratory of Learning: The Educational Museum,
Visual Culture, and Citizenship in Canada West 65
3 Whose Lessons?
Subjects of the Colonial Archive 103
Part Two
Visibly Public: Spectacularizing Social Identities
in Victorian Canada 139
4 Staging a Siege: Or, the Cultural Politics of
Re-Producing Modern History 145
5 Bilingual Memories: A Souvenir of the Diamond Jubilee
in Quebec City, 1897 185
6 “The Body Corporate Gets a Wriggle On”:
The Civic Parade in Montreal, 1897 221
Part Three
Visibly Related: Small Group Portraiture and the
Display of the Social Self 259
7 “Born with a Silver Spoon and Fork”: Photographic
Testimonies of Acculturation, Montreal, 1873 265
8 The Family Portrait: Portrait of the
Artist as a Successful Man 301
9 Visual Rhetoric: Storytelling, History, and Identity in
a Portrait of Three Friends 333
Postscript 355
Illustration Credits 359
Notes 363
Bibliography 417
Index 449
viii contents
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Z Y
This project has covered a lot of time and territory. The first research
was done while I was still a phd student in the early 1990s, with some
archival work being done in Canada, England, and the United States.
Parts of some chapters have had prior life as conference papers or case
studies in graduate seminars. The long gestation of the book means
that I owe a debt of gratitude to many people, both professionals and
personal friends.
I owe a special thank you to Marcia Pointon, who was my phd super-
visor and has become a friend and mentor. She urged me back into the
fray after I was forced to take several years off due to illness. Several
colleagues have read parts of the writing, either in article form or as
the research material was consolidated into chapters. For this service,
I thank anonymous reviewers at raCar, Symploke, and the University
of Toronto Quarterly. I owe a large debt of gratitude to my colleague
at York University, Sarah Parsons, who read the entire manuscript
and offered insight, corrections, and encouragement. Alain Belle-
ville, Lisa Farley, Virginia McKendry, Marcia Pointon, Jerry Shiner,
Sara Stanworth-Cunnane, Richard Schneider, Carol Zemel, and Joyce
Zemans have read parts of the book across the years. The work has
been strengthened by the close readings and editing offered by Kath-
ryn Simpson. The “beast” was printed, delivered, and named by my
research assistant, Jane Griffith. Jane also read and commented on the
entire manuscript.
I have benefited from the enthusiasm and dedication of research
assistants who have assisted me over the years, some of whom are now
colleagues. These include: Annie Gerin, Ken Allen, Sarah Bassnett,
Maggie Petrou, and Ekatarine Kotikova. I have many archival and his-
torical librarians to thank, including the oise Research Librarian; the
Special Collections Librarian at the National Art Library, Victoria and
Albert Museum, London; the librarian at a small community library in
Anglesey, Wales, who helped me in the last moments of editing, done
while visiting very patient relatives. I am also grateful for the assistance