I am super excited to announce that I have my first solo exhibition coming in October to December 2024. The theme of this exhibition in on "Historical Ottawa", with 5 pieces showing snaps of time in Ottawa's history.
The exhibition will be at the St. Laurent Library, located on Cote Street Ottawa, ON.
Here is a sneak peak of the paintings in various stages of completion.
The painting, titled, "Ottawa River Pigs (Lumberjacks): depicts men clearing a log jam on the river set back in 1760-1900's. The Ottawa River was lined with majestic white pines that were cut down, logs squared, timber rafts created and driven down river to Montreal and Quebec City to be used for ship building to support the Napoleonic Wars. In the peak of the lumber trade, over 1 billion board feet annually were floated down various tributaries to the Ottawa River. Present day, there isn't enough pine trees left to create a single raft.
The painting titled, "The Rideau Canal" is to commensurate the building of the Rideau Canal. Construction on the canal started in the fall of 1826 and was completed in 1832 and used for commercial shipping. it is the oldest continuous operated canal system in North America. It is 202 km long and has 46 locks. Hundreds of men, women and children died during the construction of the canal, attributed to malaria as well as seven separate accidental deaths.
The third piece is titled, "Street Car 108". Ottawa had its first street car in 1891. The company would go on to build 1,700 streetcars and rail vehicles before closing in 1947 and the last street cars that operated in Ottawa ended in 1959. With industrialization and progress the City transition to motorized buses until September 2019 when electric Light Rail Transit was introduced.
The painting titled, "The Great Fire of April 26, 1900", where 90% of downtown Hull and Le Breton Flats was destroyed by a fire. There were many fires that Ottawa and Hull faced prior to and after the Great fire, including but not limited to Hull being partially burnt down in 1875, 1880 and 1888, Ottawa's Central Post Office on January 4, 1904 and Parliament Buildings on February 3, 1916. To this day, the City of Ottawa and Federal Government is still trying to decide what to do with Le Breton Flats that has been a ghost town for almost 125 years.
The painting titled, "Log jammers", represent boats that were used to push logs together and tugged to various mill operations on both sides of the river. The development of steamboat transportation marked the end of the log driving on the Ottawa River. The process continued on a couple of its tributaries, but slowly disappeared as the railroad and the roads appeared.
I hope that you be able to stop by to view the finished works on person.
Thank you - Jennifer.
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