Arthur Lismer

Arthur Lismer (1885-1969) was an English-Canadian landscape artist and educator. As a young man he apprenticed as an engraver in his native Sheffield and then went on to study at the Sheffield School of Art. In 1906 he studied at the Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts in Antwerp. He returned to Sheffield, where he worked in a commercial art studio. Lismer moved to Toronto, Canada in 1911 where he was employed as an engraver at David Smith and Co. He later moved to the Grip company where he met other future members of the “Group of Seven”, an influential group of artists who sought direct contact with the spiritual character and elemental force of the Canadian landscape. Lismer taught at the Ontario College of Art from 1915 and was principal at the Nova Scotia College of Art, Halifax from 1916 to 1919. He returned to Toronto to become vice principal of the Ontario College of Art from 1920 to 1927.