Ordinary Magic: A Biographical Sketch of Alex Colville

Ordinary Magic – a Biographical Sketch of Alex Colville, with reproductions of his more recent works by J. R. C. Perkin; Co-Published by Lancelot Press Limited, Hantsport, Nova Scotia and Robert Pope Foundation, Hantsport, Nova Scotia, 1995. Born in 1920 in Toronto, Ontario, Colville moved with his family at age seven to St. Catharines, and then to Amherst, Nova Scotia in 1929. He attended Mount Allison University from 1938 to 1942, graduating with a Bachelor of Fine Arts. He married Rhoda Wright in 1942 and enlisted in the Canadian Army in the infantry, eventually earning the rank of lieutenant. He took part in the Royal Canadian Navy's landings in southern France. He was then attached to the 3rd Canadian Division. In the army for two years, and because he was a fine-arts student, he was made a war artist in May 1944. Colville returned to New Brunswick after the war and became a faculty member with the Fine Arts Department at Mount Allison University. In 1973, he moved his family to his wife's hometown of Wolfville, where they lived and worked in the house that her father built and in which she was born. Alex Colville's work is found in many collections including the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia, the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Musée National d'Art Moderne in Paris, the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa, the Centre National d'Art et de Culture Georges Pompidou in Paris, the Wallraf-Richartz Museum in Cologne and the Kestnergesellschaft in Hanover, Germany. This book contains all of Colville’s work for the past decade and presented here for the first time in book form – 35 beautifully reproduced colour images. A biographical sketch by long-term friend, J. R. C. Perkin, gives insightful views of the man and the artist. During much of the time Dr. Perkin was president of Acadia university, Alex Colville was Chancellor. Out of their extended conversations, reviewing past and present work, comes the present volume. This large format book, 180 pages measuring 228mm X 255mm, is fine condition. The dust jacket is in near-fine condition and is now in a protective mylar wrap. A must have book in any Colville collection.…