Friday Feature: Tom Thomson

The Jack Pine by Tom Thomson

This is an ode to the glory of Tom Thomson and his Canadian "Group of Seven."  

In the 1980s my family traveled every year to beautiful Algonquin Park in Ontario, Canada.  It is an amazing maze of lakes and streams.  It is full of loons and moose.  From my memories I can tell you that Tom Thomson truly captured the graceful wild beauty of that landscape.  

And yet... 

and yet while he was inspired by natural form he would let go of realism just enough to allow for a heightened sense of color.  Seeing his work is like looking through technicolor glasses... 

or Paul Simon's "Kodachrome," those  

nice bright colors, the greens of summers that make you think all the world's a sunny place.

And it is.

Autumn's Garland by Tom Thomson