THE CANADA YEARS by J. F. Thorsteinsson

During the Canada years, Jonas studied local art. He was fascinated with Aboriginal art from the point of The Forks and the Red River.

He traveled to follow the flooding of rivers and seeing the frozen lake Winnipeg in content with Lawrence Harris, Krieghoff, and Kane.

Moving to Ottawa got him acquainted with Nationalism and the Group of Seven.

He noted that since the 1930s, Canadian painters had developed a wide range of highly individual styles with many traces from Nordic Art.

He studied Emily Carr and her paintings of totem poles, native villages, and the forests of British Columbia.

Other painters he noted included the landscape artist David Milne and the prairie painter William Kurelek.

In Quebec, he closely studied post-impressionist and fauvist art Paul-Émile Borduas and Jean-Paul Riopelle in the modernist collective known as Les Automatistes.

In Ottawa, he studied philosophy and mass communications, Truth and Propaganda based on Propaganda and the Ethics of Persuasion, which examines historical, ethical, and legal issues relating to propaganda by Ottawa’s Orwell.

Facto is: For 400 years Indigenous people welcomed successive waves of settlers to the upper half of North America.

These newcomers would not have survived in our adverse climate and rugged habitat without Indigenous hospitality and expertise.

Jonas was fascinated by the Indigenous concept of inclusion that leaves room for multiple identities and loyalties.

It sees no contradiction between diversity and fairness.

It imagines belonging as an inclusive circle that continuously expands regardless of where you have come from and adapts to changing circumstances.

It seeks a balance between place, group, and individual.

Selected sketches from Canada