Are you someone who enjoys creating art? There are multiple forms of art, ranging from literature to performing arts to visual arts, that allow for the expression of theories and human creativity. Melvin Benson, an Ojibwe artist who taught at Samson Alternate School, found inspiration
Large painting – a copy of a Morriseau piece done by artist Melvin Benson ca. 1992. Benson was an Ojibwe artist who taught at Samson Alternate School.
The painting features a figure in blue looking towards the left. The individual has bright yellow eyes, black hair, and a colorful headpiece of blue, red, green, yellow, pink, and purple.
Painted at Samson Alternate School by artist Mel Benson where Benson was teaching art. Benson admired Morriseau’s work and decided to make a copy where it would be hung at the school. Eventually it would be given to Mrs. Arnold and she had it on display in the museum for approximately twenty years. In 2015, Mrs. Arnold would hang the piece in her office (teacher) until she chose to return it to the WDHM for preservation purposes.
Norval Morrisseau was an Anishinaabe Aboriginal Canadian artist. Best known for his paintings of mythical tableaux, his narrative works of figures and animals were painted in vibrant, fluorescent colors featuring thick black outlines akin to stained glass windows or woodcuts. “These paintings only remind you that you’re an Indian. Inside somewhere, we’re all Indians,” the self-taught artist once said. “So now when I befriend you, I’m trying to get the best Indian, bring out that Indianness in you to make you think that everything is sacred.” Born on March 14, 1932, in Beardmore, Ontario, he achieved widespread national success throughout his artistic career, garnering major commissions such as a large mural created for Expo 67 in 1967, which expressed the political dissatisfaction of the First Nations People of Canada. Morrisseau also regularly exhibited and sold his work in various Canadian galleries until his death in Toronto on December 4, 2007. Today, his work can be found in the collections of the Royal Ontario Museum, the National Gallery of Canada, the Dennos Museum Center, and the Art Gallery of Windsor, among many others.