Review of On site with Maurice Haycock, artist of the Arctic: painting and drawing of historical sites in the Canadain Arctic, by Kathy Haycock

Abstract

It’s not surprising that Maurice Haycock’s art project combines aspects of a geological survey with characteristics of the practice of the dominant Canadian landscape painters of the early 20th century. His father was a professor of geology at Acadia University in Wolfville, Nova Scotia, and Maurice chose to follow in his footsteps, graduating from Acadia in 1926, and then going on to Princeton University where he received a PhD in Economic Geology in 1931. He then joined the Bureau of Mines in the Canadian Department of Resources and Development in Ottawa, where he worked until his retirement in 1965. Young Haycock took summer jobs every year between 1918 and 1931 with the Geological Survey of Canada, which gave him invaluable field experience, and in 1926, as a break before undertaking graduate work, he accepted a 15-month assignment with the Survey in the eastern Arctic. Returning near the end of August 1927, he boarded the government supply ship The Beothic in Pangnirtung, which was that summer carrying the well-known “Group of Seven” artist A.Y. Jackson and his friend, the famous scientist and amateur painter, Dr Frederick Banting. It was a chance encounter that ultimately would bring a significant new dimension to Haycock’s life.