Downes is frequently cataloged as a Canadian artist; it is an unnecessary sociological tendency to classify an artist according to their country. He was a man that lived larger than life, and those two words - “Canadian artist” - hems him in and fails to tell the whole story. Born in England, raised in Canada with art training in both Canada and the United States, a war artist with the Royal Air Force (1940-45)* and his life intersected with a list of Who’s Who in art. Stylistically his work stands out from the numerous artists who worked in mid-century England, France and North America. His expressionistic-realism is raw, refreshing and unique.
In the painting “Old Town - Québec” below, Downes uses his expressionist painterly style from the mid-1950s to create a cityscape painting. Downes centers the composition at the intersection of Rue Garneau and Côte de la Fabrique where the historic Maison Larchevêque-Lelièvre was started in 1727. The trapezoidal stone building comes with its own story, three and a half stories tall, topped with a straight-pitched roof pierced with dormer windows. The narrow façade serves as a backdrop for the two nuns who gather tightly under an umbrella. On the streetscape we see two priests out and about in the rain.
It is not surprising to see these men of the cloth and the two nuns, they are part of the local seminary located at the Basilique-Cathédrale Notre-Dame, on the right side of the composition. The church building and bell-tower was designed by Jean Baillaigè and has a gold ornate interior. Just outside of the composition behind the greenery is Québec City Hall. On the left side of the composition is the famed restaurant Chez Livernois and further up the street outside the frame is the Irish restaurant, Pub Saint Patrick.
The painting provides a memory lane to former Québec occupants and visitors, as well as an opportunity for young viewers to see how Old Town once looked and felt in 1956. The streetscape is more than storytelling; it is an emotional bond that takes the viewer back to another time when nuns wore habits, covered horse buggies trotted down the street, and cars were black. The telephone poles are painted red and white on the crowded Rue Garneau and Downes fills elements of the sky with telephone wires, streetlights and a church bell turret topped with the symbols of the faith. Downes created this painting just three years after spending time at the Art Students League of New York. The photos below illustrate the same scene over the years.
*** Fielding Downes has works are in the permanent collections of the Canadian War Museum (Ottawa, Ontario), the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (Quebec), and the Quebec Museum of Fine Arts (Quebec City).
- Note: Researcher M. D. Silverbrooke states the following: Most of our sources include a line stating that Downes studied at the “Wells Blye School”, Somerset, England under Amy Phelps and Wilfred Ball (see askART); but, the name of the school must be a typo copied by subsequent biographers because we could not find any school by that name in Somerset. There is however a school named the Wells Blue School (aka: The Blue School, Wells) which was founded in 1641 and is still operating in 2023. Source: U.K. National Archives.
Sources – Books, Catalogs and a Newspaper Articles:
In the painting “Old Town - Québec” below, Downes uses his expressionist painterly style from the mid-1950s to create a cityscape painting. Downes centers the composition at the intersection of Rue Garneau and Côte de la Fabrique where the historic Maison Larchevêque-Lelièvre was started in 1727. The trapezoidal stone building comes with its own story, three and a half stories tall, topped with a straight-pitched roof pierced with dormer windows. The narrow façade serves as a backdrop for the two nuns who gather tightly under an umbrella. On the streetscape we see two priests out and about in the rain.
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| Signed LRC: L Fielding Downes Oil on Canvas, 24 X 18 Inches Framed in Orlando, FL "Old Town -Québec" |
The painting provides a memory lane to former Québec occupants and visitors, as well as an opportunity for young viewers to see how Old Town once looked and felt in 1956. The streetscape is more than storytelling; it is an emotional bond that takes the viewer back to another time when nuns wore habits, covered horse buggies trotted down the street, and cars were black. The telephone poles are painted red and white on the crowded Rue Garneau and Downes fills elements of the sky with telephone wires, streetlights and a church bell turret topped with the symbols of the faith. Downes created this painting just three years after spending time at the Art Students League of New York. The photos below illustrate the same scene over the years.
In this expressionist-realism painting, Downes creates emotion about a sense of place by using his three-dimensional draftsmanship skills with a foreground and background through an altered perspective. There is a spatial relationship between the people and the street and he weaves a rainy day at dusk with blues, grays and a touch of white that reflects the slippery street. The shop windows and lighted signs provide a spark of color contrasting the pending nightfall. The composition is balanced, enclosed and pushes the limits of his painterly textured brushwork that is almost like thick butter and expressionistic at the same time the scene is realism.
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| National Library Archives of Quebec Photo de Fielding Downes accompagnant l'article de Claire-P. Gagnon, "Une Exposition de L.-Fielding Downes"**, La Patrie, samedi 6 avril 1957 à la p. 42 et disponibleau permalien |
Pierre Antonine Trembley and M. D. Silverbrooke assembled facts on Downs. Trembley documented information early on about Downes and Silverbooke came later researching and confirming the facts and provides the best documentation available today. There sources include a long and impressive list of mostly Canadian art teachers and associates for Downes; They state the following about his art training: "they include studies in illustration under Charles Comfort and Hal Foster in Winnipeg (c. 1918–1921); the Federal School of Commercial Design, Minneapolis [Note: our source uses the name Federal School of Design] (1918); the Winnipeg School of Art under Franz Johnston (1919–1923); the Art Institute of Chicago (1923); sketching with Nicholas de Grandmaison, most likely in upper Alberta (1926); painting under Lionel Lemoine Fitzgerald (in the early 1930s, most likely in Winnipeg); a move to Montreal in the 1930s where he illustrated magazines and painted with Arthur Lismer and Frederick Simpson Coburn (1934–1936); and the Art Students League of New York under Louis George Bouche (1951–1953).”
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| Copy of the page on L. Fielding Downes By Pierre Antonine Trembley |
Working in oils, pastels and watercolors, Downes painted Québec scenes, landscapes, still lifes and figures. Downes enjoyed considerable popularity in North America and abroad during the sixties and early seventies. His paintings have been exhibited at the Museum of Fine Arts of Montréal, the Montréal Art Gallery, l'Art Francaise Gallery of Montreal, the Royal Canadian Academy, the Beaverbrook National Gallery of Fredericton, N.B., and the Israel National Gallery of Tel-Aviv.*** In the United States he exhibited at the Palette and Chisel Club of Chicago, the Art Students League of New York, and the Veerhoff Galleries (now closed) of Washington, D.C.
Lionel Fielding Downes died on December 28, 1972 in Ste-Foy, Québec, Canada.
Footnotes:
* Downes exhibited with the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts in 1945 and with the Spring Exhibitions at the Montreal Museum of fine arts from 1936 to 1954. The Ottawa Journal, 10 Oct. 1970, Sat., Page 62: was a war artist with the RAF (1940-45). His painting "Terror in the Night" now hangs in the National Gallery of Israel. Additionally: The Dictionary of Canadian Artists A to F and The Collector's Dictionary of Canadian Artists at Auction say Downes served in the RAF [sic] as a “War Artist” (1940 – 45). According to researcher, M. D. Silverbrooke this information is debatable.*** Fielding Downes has works are in the permanent collections of the Canadian War Museum (Ottawa, Ontario), the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (Quebec), and the Quebec Museum of Fine Arts (Quebec City).
- Note: Researcher M. D. Silverbrooke states the following: Most of our sources include a line stating that Downes studied at the “Wells Blye School”, Somerset, England under Amy Phelps and Wilfred Ball (see askART); but, the name of the school must be a typo copied by subsequent biographers because we could not find any school by that name in Somerset. There is however a school named the Wells Blue School (aka: The Blue School, Wells) which was founded in 1641 and is still operating in 2023. Source: U.K. National Archives.
Sources – Books, Catalogs and a Newspaper Articles:
- The Collector's Dictionary of Canadian Artists at Auction (2001), by Anthony R. Westbridge and Diana L. Bodnar.
- A Dictionary of Canadian Artists A to F 5th edition (1997), by Colin S. MacDonald; Canadian Paperbacks Publishing Limited, Ottawa, Ontario.
- Royal Canadian Academy of Arts: Exhibitions and Members, 1880 – 1979 (1997), by Evelyn de R. McMann; University of Toronto Press.
- Montreal Museum of Fine Arts: Spring Exhibitions 1880 – 1970 (1988), by Evelyn de R. McMann.
- Royal Canadian Academy of Arts: Exhibitions and Members, 1880 – 1979 (1981), by Evelyn de R. McMann.
- "Une Exposition de L. Fielding Downes" - Palais Montcalm, Claire-P. Gagnon, (photo above) La Patrie, samedi 6 avril 1957** - another article covers his portrait of Edith Piaf.
- Galerie l'Art François (Montreal, Quebec), 1946, 8 numbered pages, You are cordially invited to attend an exhibition of oil paintings by L. Fielding Downes, May 4th to 18th, 1946 (above).
The Montreal Daily Star
Sat., 6 Dec. 1952, Pg. 23
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©2023. Waller-Yoblonsky Fine Art is a research collaborative, working to track artists that got lost and overlooked due to time, changing styles, race, gender and/or sexual orientation. Our frequent blogs highlight artists and art movements that need renewed attention with improved information for the researcher and art collectors. The photos and blog were created by Mr. Waller and all written materials were obtained by the Fair Use Section 107 of The Copyright Act in the United States. #waller-yoblonskyblogspot #walleryoblonskyblogspot #L.FieldingDownes #LionelFieldingDownes #Expressionism #expressionism-realism #canadianartistfieldingdownes
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