left panel signed & dated
Provenance: This work comes from a private Calgary collection, having been acquired directly from Spickett by the parents of the consignor, who were friends of the artist. It has come by descent to the current owner.
Note: Ron Spickett initially trained with Gus Kenderdine, in his native Regina, before coming to Calgary to study at the Provincial Institute of Technology and Art (now SAIT/ACAD), attending from 1946-49. Following his studies, he worked long hours at a number of commercial jobs, including as a window display artist for the Hudson Bay Co., painting and exhibiting when he could. Then, in 1955, Spickett won a full scholarship to attend the Instituto Allende, in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico.
Mexico was at the forefront of the Post WWII wave of interest in mural painting, led by internationally acclaimed artists such as Jose Clemente Orozco, David Alfaro Siqueiros, and Diego Rivera. Spickett had himself produced a mural for the Provincial Institute in 1949, while studying under Buck Kerr, and soon after that developed a series on the Human Condition, also a theme of focus with the Mexican muralists. While in Mexico (1955-56), Spickett was able to immerse himself in his work and experiment with his techniques. He toured Mexico City and Guadelajara to see murals, “took side trips and saw religious parades…also art showing suffering” (p. 58*).
Spickett’s approach to figures, colour and medium were affected by his time in Mexico. For a time, Spickett became passionate about bringing muralism to Canada, and hoped to encourage Canadian clients (public and corporate) to commission murals. He produced a number of mural sketches, one of which was selected by the National Gallery for a touring exhibition. While this dream proved elusive, Spickett did go on to produce a number of murals, most lost, including a major 13-metre wide mural in the lobby of the Bowlen Building in Calgary.
The Nickle Arts Museum (Calgary) held a major retrospective of Spickett’s work “The Spirit Matters” in 2009.
*Reference: “Spirit Matters – Ron (Gyo-Zo) Spickett, Artist, Poet, Lay-Priest” (Simmons; University of Calgary Press, 2009). See page 64 for a similar work from this period.
