Albert H. Robinson (1881-1956)

Albert Henry Robinson was born in Hamilton, Ontario, and began working at the Hamilton Times as an illustrator and political cartoonist. He studied in Paris before returning to Canada and moving to Montreal, where he met a number of important artists, notably A.Y. Jackson, who became a traveling and sketching partner. During one of these trips along the St. Lawrence River Robinson did the sketch for his most famous painting, Returning From Easter Mass, 1922, now in the National Gallery of Canada. The work is a bridge between earlier romantic Quebec artists and the more decorative but basically naturalistic approach of Jackson and the Group of Seven. Robinson exhibited widely in Canada and abroad including shows with the Group and was a member of the Canadian Group of Painters, which replaced it in 1933.¹

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¹ “Art for War and Peace: How a Great Art Project Helped Canada Discover Itself” by Ian Sigvaldason/Scott Steedman published by Read Leaf 2015