Sold for: $34,250

PROVENANCE
Galerie Agnès Lefort, Montreal
Marlborough-Godard, Montreal
By descent to the present Private Collection, British Columbia

LITERATURE
David P. Silcox, Painting Place: The Life and Work of David B. Milne, 1996, pages 281 and 284
David Milne Jr. and David P. Silcox, David B. Milne: Catalogue Raisonné of the Paintings, Volume 2: 1929 – 1953, 1998, reproduced page 665, catalogue #306.30

In 1938, David Milne was living in the isolated cabin at Six Mile Lake that he had built in 1933. He did not produce any oils that year and instead concentrated on watercolour, a medium he had abandoned in 1925. His style had evolved, and David Silcox wrote: “Unlike his last watercolours in 1925, which were rich, reserved, and austere…the new ones were fluid, reminiscent of the most vigorous and experimental excursions of Milne’s New York years and recalling his wide, bright palette of that time in their splashy variety of colour. "Milne “now ‘thought’ in watercolour.” His paintings were fresh and immediate, and he reveled in the freedom of a certain roughness facilitated by his speed of execution—which can be seen in Landing on the Rock, with its dark-grey washes in the rock formations. While these grey washes give the impression of mass, Milne lets in space by interspersing some areas of unpainted paper, and in contrast the water is also unpainted. Milne’s canoe is drawn up on the shore, and he has created a charming outdoor still life of his day camp with coffee pot, glasses and painting supplies scattered casually on the rocks. These objects are painted with bright pops of colour amid the grey, giving a vivacity to this picture of Milne’s creative life in the natural setting of Six Mile Lake.

All prices are in Canadian Dollars