Gordon Mckinley Webber

Gordon Webber (March 12, 1909 – November 17, 1965) was a multimedia pioneer of modernism in Canada. He was also an educator.

Career Gordon Webber was born in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, the eldest of five children. He was introduced to fine art by his mother.

Webber was recognized as a talented student since 1930 when he was invited to show with the Group of Seven. In the early 1930s, Webber began teaching with Lismer at the Art Gallery of Toronto. During these years, he was a figurative artist. During these years, Webber experimented with photography and film, drawing directly on 35 mm film stock having learned the technique through Norman McLaren at the National Film Board of Canada studios in Montreal. Webber also sought to preserve historic Canadian architecture.

Selected solo exhibitions In 1936 and 1937, Webber held an exhibition of Paintings and Drawings: "Mexican Impressions" at Mellors Gallery, Toronto. In 1936 and 1937, having helped found the Picture Loan Society in Toronto, he held two exhibitions there. In 1949, he had a show at the School of Architecture, McGill University, Montreal, and in 1959, an exhibition of his paintings was held at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts. In 2000, a posthumous show was organized by the Art Gallery of Algoma, Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario.

Selected group exhibitions In 1928, he participated in an Art Students' League Exhibition, Hart House, University of Toronto, Toronto. Webber showed mainly with the Canadian Group of Painters (1935–1946) but he also showed with the Ontario Society of Artists (1930–1935), with the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts (1934 and 1936), with the Canadian Society of Painters in Water Colour in Toronto (1934–1936) and in the Art Association of Montreal Spring Show (1942–1955). In 1943, a show of Edna Taçon, Jessie Faunt, Michael Forster, and Webber, was held at the Art Gallery of Toronto, Toronto. In 1951, his work was included in Painters Portraits, Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, Montreal and in 1959, in the Exposition Helmut Gransow et Gordon Webber, Galerie Norton and Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, Montreal. In 1994, his work was included in Origins of Abstraction in Canada: Modernist Pioneers, Robert McLaughlin Gallery, Oshawa.

Selected awards Ontario College of Art Fellowship (1924–1927); Carnegie Fellowship, Chicago School of Design (1938–1942) Museum of Modern Art, New York, prize (1941)

Selected public collections Auckland Art Gallery, Auckland, New Zealand; Glasgow Art Gallery and Museum Glasgow, Scotland; Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, ON; Justina M. Barnicke Gallery, Art Museum, University of Toronto, ON; Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, Montreal, QC; National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, ON; Robert McLaughlin Gallery, Oshawa, ON

Selected memberships Canadian Group of Painters (1937); Canadian Federation of Artists (1943); Executive Officer, Canadian Federation of Artists (1944); President, Canadian Group of Painters, Montreal Chapter, (Eastern Group of Painters) (1959–1969); Association of Canadian Industrial Designers Member; L'Association des artistes non-figuratifs de Montréal

Personal life Born with spina bifida, he spent much of his youth in medical care. In 1929, Dr. Frederick Banting took an interest in his disability. Following consultation with the Head Surgeon of the Medical School at the University of Toronto, Webber's lame leg was amputated just above the knee. He was fitted with a wooden leg after the surgery, and acquired new mobility. He died of a heart attack in Montreal in 1959, after making four speeches in the campaign to save an historic house marked for demolition in Perth, Ontario. As Robert Ayre wrote in "McGill Ceremony Will Honor Gordon Webber", in the Montreal Star, November 19, 1965, Gordon Webber was a radiant spirit.