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The Life of a Landscape
Artist
Scenario Sheet 5: Peter and Catharine Whyte
Description:
· Peter was born in Banff. Catharine
was born in Concord, Massachusetts. They met at art school in Boston in
1925.
· They got married in 1930 and built a log home and art studio
in Banff.
· Banff was much more rugged than Catharine's hometown. She
had to learn how to live in the mountains and do without the big house
hired help she grew up with. She grew to love her new home.
· Once,
when Peter and Catharine were camping out on a three-day hiking and
sketching trip from Moraine Lake to Lake O'Hara, Peter woke Catharine up
to tell her that a mouse had built a nest in her hair, and was still
asleep there. Catharine was thrilled.
· They had learned to paint
portraits and still lifes at art school, but not landscapes. They helped
each other with their landscape painting technique, and learned from other
artists who they hiked and sketched with, like J.E.H. MacDonald and Carl
Rungius.
· Because they hiked together and sat about 20 feet apart
when they painted, Peter and Catharine's paintings are often of the same
spot. Sometimes their sketches looked so similar Catharine couldn't tell
hers from Peter's.
· Sometimes their paintings looked very different.
Catharine liked to focus in on the clouds and sky, while Peter painted the
larger scene, with emphasis on the land and mountains.
· They liked to
paint at Lake Louise, Bow Lake, and Lake O'Hara.
· Peter and Catharine
collected the art
and
stories of the mountains, and started a museum so they could share these stories with the public. Their own
paintings and some by their artists friends are in the collection of what's now called The Whyte Museum of the Canadian Rockies in Banff.
Quotes:
"It's very hard to
finish a careful sketch in one sitting… for the light changes so rapidly
in the mountains." -Catharine Whyte to her mother, 1941
"You feel it's useless to try
to paint, for you just can't do what you want to with it; but you know you
can't leave it and stop." -Catharine Whyte to her mother, 1933
Possible Characters:
·
Peter Whyte
· Catharine Whyte
· Their artist friends and teachers
(examples: J.E.H. MacDonald, Carl Rungius)
· The mouse
Messages:
· Catharine and
Peter Whyte made their home in the mountains and loved to explore and
paint their surroundings.
· They were very strong members of the Banff
community and created a Museum to tell the stories of the people in the
mountains.
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