In 1940, the Maritime Art Association began publishing "Maritime Art: The Journal of the Maritime Art Association", the first magazine in Canada dedicated solely to the visual arts. It was edited by Walter Abell, MAA President and Professor of Fine Arts at Acadia University in Wolfville, and for three years, the magazine published reviews, features, interviews, opinion pieces and other writing on Canadian art. "Maritime Art", despite its regional name, strove to be a truly national publication. In 1941, they added the subtitle: "A Canadian Art Magazine". They accurately could have called it “the Canadian Art Magazine,” as it had no competitors.
Maritime Art was funded by the Carnegie Foundation, and when that money ran out in 1943 Walter Abell moved the magazine to Ottawa, where it was renamed "Canadian Art" and was published with the support of the National Gallery of Canada. The magazine was renamed "artscanada" in 1967, and was relaunched in 1984 as Canadian Art, which continued publishing until 2021.
From its inception "Maritime Art" pursued a novel marketing strategy of offering original works of art in each issue (this at a time when a single issue cost $0.25 and an annual subscription for five issues was $1.00!). The magazine featured original “tipped in” prints by artists from across the country, albeit with a bias towards artists from the Maritimes. "Maritime Art: Canada’s Art Magazine" features those prints, as well as copies of the magazine itself to highlight the important role that this Maritime initiative played in the development of art in Canada.
Artists in the exhibition: Annie Louise Ricker, Donald Cameron Mackay, Gwendolyn Hales, Violet Gillett, LeRoy Zwicker, Christian McKiel, Henry G. Glyde, Leonard Hutchinson, Marguerite Zwicker, Carl Schaefer, Fritz Brandtner, and Caven Atkins.
Curated by Ray Cronin and John Leroux and organized by the Beaverbrook Art Gallery.