Ethel Curry | The Ethel Curry Gallery

Ethel Luella Curry

June 29th, 1902 ~ April 27th, 2000

Known best for her intense insight into the wild beauty of the Haliburton Highlands and her ability to communicate the spirit of the forests onto canvas, Ethel Curry was known by all to be strong, free and true, both in her work and in her relationships with others.

Born in 1902 in a little log cabin nestled in the heart of the Highlands, Ethel Curry was the first born in a family of three. She was certainly not the only to harbor enterprising ambitions. A descendant of generations of exploring timber men, Ethel had been preceded by a history of creative endeavors and strong independent minds. She is best known by her admirers for her stunning paintings. However for those who knew her well there were many other dimensions that built the substance of Ethel Curry.

“The solace and inspiration of nature’s wild beauty inspires the artist to interpret and create, to carve and to build, to sculpt and to paint.”

A true child of the Canadian timberland, Ethel had been inspired by the striking beauty of the forests, an inspiration that remained deep within her throughout her life. She believed nature was “god himself” and she worked very hard to study and learn from all that nature had to offer. She devoted weeks one year to pencil sketches of the movement of water, documenting the essence of the endless forms of water and all its characteristics. Ethel was brought up in the deeps of Haliburton by a kind father, W.R. Curry, who taught her to investigate the mysteries that nature had to offer. He also inspired her to imagine and create as he demonstrated the first breed of new capitalism, resourcefully establishing needed ventures for the growing village. Ethel’s mother, Jesse Ellen, was also a strong influence in her life as she initiated her own version of the suffragette movement in Haliburton, teaching Ethel that women could enjoy the same freedoms and aspirations as men, and are competent to do the same work that men do.

Her talents were expressed in a multitude of disciplines including a notable singing voice, a keen sense of interior design, a knack for designing and manufacturing clothing as well as painting, drawing and sculpture (not to mention her sharp wit!). Ethel Curry exhibited many domestic talents yet never chose that lifestyle, claiming she had others skills that she preferred to concentrate on. She was one of the first women to join the Ontario College of Art & Design (OCAD) in Toronto and also attended University of Toronto’s Royal Conservatory of Music. Ethel was later recognized as one of the leading art teachers in Toronto while working at Northern Vocational School. She worked very hard and was known by her colleagues and teachers as an artist with exceptional talent yet with partiality to one subject matter – nature. Famed Canadian artist Doris McCarthy says “if she was asked to paint a biblical theme it would end up looking as if it were placed in Haliburton”. Group of Seven member Arthur Lismer would often comment, “there goes that Curry making everything northern again.”

Ethel studied under other members of the Group of Seven, the world-renowned painters that pioneered a new style of landscape painting in Canada, including A.E.H. MacDonald, Franz Johnson, Lauren Harris and A.Y. Jackson. She was hired by Arthur Lismer to teach art at the Toronto Art Gallery (now the Art Gallery of Ontario). Ethel was recognized by her instructors at OCA as painting like Tom Thomson long before she met or worked with any of the Group of Seven. Her professional life was filled with both triumphs and sorrows. She excelled at all she set out to do yet her disinterest in “marketing herself” cost her deserved recognition. Bob Short, a lifetime friend and Dean of Northern Vocational School where she taught art said, “Ethel was only interested in creating – putting pen to paper and doing that as well as she could”. Doris McCarthy, Ethel’s colleague and friend since OCA maintains, “Ethel was much more talented than I, yet never got the same breaks”.

Her love of the Highlands did not come from ignorance of experience. Ethel had a curious and ambitious nature that led her across Canada and out into the world. She lived in Spain for over a year and spent most of that time in recluse on a small island in the Mediterranean. Although this worldly Miss Curry learned much in her adventures she was soon drawn back to her beloved home in Haliburton where she continued to paint and live. Ethel never married or had children, yet her incredible influence and lasting effect on her students, family and friends is her legacy and will be a story told long after she is gone and her paintings have withered. Ethel Curry passed away in Haliburton on April 27, 2000, in her 98th year.

The Ethel Curry Gallery is the creative invention of one of her favorite nephews, Peter Curry, his wife Jody and a talented woodworker Wayne Hooks, all of whom see the wild beauty inherent in the Highlands.

Wayne now owns and operates the gallery. One of his aims is to encourage, promote and celebrate all others that have been inspired by Haliburton’s natural beauty to create their own works of art.

Saturday	11:00 to 5:00
Sunday	12:00 to 3:00
Monday	CLOSED
Tuesday	11:00 to 5:00
Wednesday	11:00 to 5:00
Thursday	11:00 to 5:00
Friday	11:00 to 5:00