Barbara Rae: The Northwest Passage


Interesting exhibition at Canada House of recent work by Barbra Rae.

Inspired by her namesake, the Arctic explorer and fellow Scot Dr John Rae, who explored Canada’s Arctic during his time with the Hudson Bay Company in the 1830s, Rae has made four journeys to the area. These pictures reflect the conditions she met on these trips.

There is an amazing sense of the colour blue in these works which show an abstracted version of the landscape she saw and some include ghostly figures of previous explorers. I particularly liked the smaller pictures which seemed to concentrate the image.

I liked the inclusion of Rae’s sketchbook and objects from the Belle Shenkman Collection of Inuit art.

Closes on 16 February 2019

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