Daphne Odjig
Daphne Odjig was a prominent Canadian aboriginal artist renowned for her contributions to the Woodlands style of painting, which reflects First Nations cultures. Born on September 11, 1919, in Wikwemikong, Ontario, she was of mixed Odawa-Potawatomi and English descent. Despite facing challenges, including a lack of formal education and experiences of racism, Odjig self-taught herself to paint while working various jobs in Toronto. She became a founding member of the Professional Native Indian Artists Association, also known as the Indian Group of Seven, which aimed to promote the artistic merit of aboriginal art.
Throughout her career, Odjig received numerous accolades, including the Order of Canada and honorary doctorates from several universities. Her work was celebrated in major exhibitions, including a retrospective at the National Gallery of Canada, and she was featured on Canadian postage stamps. Odjig's art was characterized by its vibrant colors and themes that often drew on her cultural heritage. She continued to create art until her passing on October 1, 2016, leaving a lasting legacy in the Canadian art community and beyond.
Subject Terms
Daphne Odjig
Artist
- Born: September 11, 1919
- Place of Birth: Wikwemikong Unceded Indian Reserve, Ontario
- Died: October 1, 2016
- Place of Death: Kelowna, British Columbia, Canada
Contribution: Daphne Odjig was a Canadian aboriginal artist who won critical acclaim and numerous awards for her work. Her style of painting, called the Woodlands style, drew from First Nations cultures. Odjig was also one of the founding members of the Professional Native Indian Artists Association, and was featured on a set of postal stamps in Canada.
Background
Daphne Odjig was born on September 11, 1919, on the Wikwemikong Unceded Indian Reserve on Manitoulin Island, in Ontario, Canada. She is of mixed Odawa-Potawatomi and English heritage. The Potawatomi were members of the Three Fires Confederacy, or Council of the Three Fires, which also included the Ojibwa and Odawa. The Odjig family was among the first members of the Potawatomi tribe to migrate northward and settle in Wikwemikong after the War of 1812. Odjig’s father, a talented musician and artist, often painted pictures depicting soldiers and other war-related scenes; her grandfather was a descendant of the great nineteenth-century Potawatomi chief Black Partridge.
Odjig suffered from rheumatic fever as a child, and her formal education ended after grade seven. After moving to Perry Sound, Ontario, she experienced her first encounters with racism, and changed her surname to Fisher, the English translation of Odjig. After relocating to Toronto in 1942, Odjig worked a number of jobs and attended dance classes in the evenings. After visiting different art galleries, as well as the Royal Ontario Museum and the Art Gallery of Toronto, she started to teach herself to paint. Odjig continued experimenting with various styles and media, including cubism and cloisonnism (a post-Impressionist style of painting).
Artistic Career
Odjig’s first solo exhibition was held in Thunder Bay, Ontario, in 1967, and featured drawings, acrylics, and pastels. In 1968, Odjig was commissioned to paint a series of erotic illustrations for the book Tales from the Smokehouse. In 1970, her work Earth Mother was exhibited in Osaka, Japan, and in 1972, she was part of a group exhibition featuring aboriginal artists, Treaty Number 23, 287, and 1171, shown at the Winnipeg Art Gallery.
In November 1973, Odjig became a founding member of the Professional Native Indian Artists Incorporation, also known as the Indian Group of Seven. The other members of the group, all professional aboriginal Canadian artists, also included Jackson Beardy, Eddy Cobiness, Alex Janvier, Norval Morisseau, Carl Ray, and Joseph Sanchez. The group’s goal was to promote their art and to have their work evaluated for its artistry rather than its “nativeness.”
At the invitation of El Al, the national Israeli airline carrier, Odjig traveled to Israel in 1975 to tour and paint her impressions of Jerusalem, collectively called the Jerusalem Series (1975–76).Various commissions of her work followed, including from Laurentian University and the Glenview Corporation in Ottawa, Ontario. In 1986, Odjig was one of four international artists chosen to pay homage to Pablo Picasso on behalf of the Picasso Museum in Antibes, France.
Odjig announced her official retirement in 1999, but continued to work on her art, including In Tune with the Infinite (2004). In 2005, Kamloops Art Gallery in Kamloops, British Columbia, displayed Forty Years of Prints, an exhibition of her limited edition prints. From September 2007 through January 2010, the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa, Ontario, presented a solo retrospective exhibition of Odjig’s work in conjunction with the Art Gallery of Sudbury. The exhibition, The Drawings and Paintings of Daphne Odjig, was curated by Bonnie Devine and covered forty-four years of Odig’s career.
In 2012, Odjig’s work was selected for a group exhibit of new Aboriginal works in the ballroom of Rideau Hall, the residence of the governor general. The exhibit, which also included the work of Carl Beam, George Clutesi, Alex Janvier, was on display through 2014.
Awards
Odjig received numerous accolades during her career. In 1977, she received Canada’s Silver Jubilee Medal, and in 1986 she was appointed to the Order of Canada. She was elected a member of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts in 1989. Odjig also received a National Aboriginal Achievement Award in Toronto in 1998. In 2002 and again in 2011, Canada Post issued postage stamps honoring Odjig’s work. In 2007, she received the Governor General’s Award in Visual and Media Arts. In addition to these honors, she holds honorary doctorates from the University of Toronto (1985), the Ontario College of Art and Design (2008), the University of Western Ontario (2008), and several other institutions.
Odjig’s work has been featured in several films and documentaries. She has also worked as an arts instructor at the Manitou Arts Foundation on Schreiber Island, Ontario, in 1971 and was a juror for the Canadian Native Arts Foundation in 1996.
Personal Life
Odjig married Paul Somerville, a World War II veteran, in 1945. The couple had two sons. After her husband died in an automobile accident in 1960, Odjig dealt with her grief by working on the strawberry farm she and Somerville had built, and by immersing in painting. In 1962, Odjig married Chester Beavon. The couple moved to Penticton, British Columbia, in 1999.
Odjig died on October 1, 2016, in a care facility in Kelowna, British Columbia. She was 97.
Bibliography
Bailey, Jann L. M. “Firebrand Artist Daphne Odjig.” Herizons 24.4 (2011): 24–28. Print.
“Daphne Odjig.” National Gallery of Canada, 2024, www.gallery.ca/collection/artist/daphne-odjig. Accessed 19 Sept. 2024.
Devine, Bonnie. “Daphne Odjig." Canadian Encyclopedia, 9 Aug. 2022, www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/daphne-odjig. Accessed 19 Sept. 2024.
Devine, Bonnie. The Drawings and Paintings of Daphne Odjig: A Retrospective Exhibition. Ottawa: National Gallery of Canada, 2007.
Korp, Maureen. “The Bad Medicine Woman and Other Images of Womanhood in the Work of Daphne Odjig, RCA.” Source: Anima 20.1 (1993): 20–32. Print.
The Life and Work of Daphne Odjig. Dir. Raoul McKay. First Voice Multimedia and Public Prairie Television, 2008. DVD.
The Life and Work of the Woodland Artists. Prod. Raoul McKay. Moving Images Distribution, 2003. DVD.
Nathoo, Zulekha. “'Indian Group of Seven' artist Daphne Odjig dead at 97." CBC/Radio-Canada, 2 Oct. 2016, www.cbc.ca/news/entertainment/daphne-odjig-dead-1.3788123. Accessed 19 Sept. 2024.
Patton, Kristi. “Daphne Odjig: A Tribute to Courage at Penticton Art Gallery.” Penticton Western News 29 Mar. 2012: Entertainment 1. Print.
Stroffman, Judy. “The Grand Old Dame of Indian Art: Daphne Odjig’s Work Has Been Compared to That of Picasso.” Toronto Star 2 June 2001: J3+. Print.