TABLE OF CONTENTS

Collection Summary

Biographical Sketch

Scope and Content

Index Terms

Administrative Information

Processing Information

Preferred Citation

Contact Information

Box List

Brydon Smith fonds:

Finding Aid

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Biographical Sketch

Brydon Evans Smith, art historian and curator of modern and contemporary art, was born in 1938 in Hamilton, Ontario. He earned a Bachelor of Arts in Science Studies at McMaster University in 1961, and a Master of Arts in Art History at the University of Toronto in 1965. While working on his MA Smith was hired by Jean Sutherland Boggs as an assistant curator at the Art Gallery of Toronto (AGT), where he contributed to the first comprehensive Canadian exhibition featuring the work of the Venetian painter Canaletto (1697-1768). Among other early projects at the AGT, Smith worked on an exhibition devoted to Duncan Macpherson, a Toronto Star cartoonist, in 1965, and a show featuring the work of Piet Mondrian, in 1966. After Smith was appointed curator of modern art in 1966, he organized the exhibition entitled Dine, Oldenburg, Segal. His interest in American contemporary art led to the Art Gallery of Ontario's purchase of Giant Hamburger (1962) by Claes Oldenburg.

After Jean Sutherland Boggs left Toronto and joined the the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa in 1966, she encouraged Smith to join her; he was hired by the Gallery as curator (non-Canadian) of contemporary art in 1967. He was appointed Assistant Director of Collections and Research in 1979 and curator of Twentieth Century Art in 1994. Under Smith's leadership, a long standing gallery policy against the purchase of American art was reversed in 1967, when the Gallery acquired Andy Warhol's Brillo Boxes. His appreciation of Dan Flavin's work led to introductions to fellow artists Donald Judd and Carl Andre and the subsequent purchase of Flavin's Nominal Three, Monument 4 and IconIV, Donald Judd's Untitled 1963 and Untitled 1966, and Carl Andre's Lever, 144 Copper Square, and Pile. Smith's most controversial purchase was Voice of Fire by American artist Barnettt Newman in 1990. The $1.76 million price tag for this painting was the most ever spent by the National Gallery on a single work and generated a public outcry. Other notable acquisitions during Smith's tenure at the Gallery include Camels by the New York artist Nancy Graves. (Smith bought one and a donor purchased and donated the other two so that the exhibited work would be intact), Robert Morris's 254 Pieces of Felt , George Segal's The Gas Station, Claes Oldenburg's Bedroom Ensemble, James Rosenquist's Painting for the American Negro and Capillary Action 11, Donald Judd's Specific Objects, Jackson Pollock's No 29, and Mark Rothko's No 16. In total, Smith was involved in ninety-four acquisitions by the National Gallery.

Smith's first major exhibition at the National Gallery featured works by the American pop artist James Rosenquist, in 1968. Other important exhibitions that Smith organized include Dan Flavin's Fluorescent Lights (1970), Donald Judd's Making Spaces: the Art and Architecture of Donald Judd (1975) and Escher: Mindscapes to Landscapes (1999). After thirty-two years at the National Gallery, Smith retired on March 19, 1999. Following his retirement, he continued to work on projects involving such artists as Donald Judd, Dan Flavin, and Ron Martin.

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Scope and Content

The fonds includes items compiled and produced by Smith during his student years at the University of Toronto, research material related to Smith's tenure as a curator at the Art Gallery of Toronto (later the Art Gallery of Ontario) and at the National Gallery of Canada, and research material related to projects undertaken after his retirement from the National Gallery in 1999. Among the material collected by Smith during his time at the Art Gallery of Toronto are clippings, notes, and photographs related to exhibitions on Canaletto, Post-Painterly Abstraction, and Mondrian. Material compiled during Smith's years at the National Gallery of Canada include articles, clippings, typescripts, and photographs pertaining to exhibitions on James Rosenquist, Dan Flavin, Donald Judd, and M.C. Escher. Also included are several files related to the National Gallery's controversial purchase of Barnett Newman's Voice of Fire. The files compiled after Smith left the National Gallery mainly contain research material regarding Ron Martin, Donald Flavin, and Donald Judd, and Smith's associaton with the Chinati Foundation, a contemporary art museum founded by Donald Judd in Marfa, Texas, and the Judd Foundation, an organizaton formed in 1996 to preserve the work and installations of Judd in Marfa.

Source of title proper: Title based on contents of fonds.

Physical description: Photographs include 573 b&w photographs, 261 b&w negatives, 93 colour photographs, 1 colour negative, 1,661 colour slides, 5 colour transparencies, and 2 colour Polaroids. Other material includes 42 posters and 3 audio cassettes.

Immediate source of acquisition: Donated to the National Gallery of Canada Library and Archives by Brydon Smith in 2010.

Terms governing use and reproduction: Permission to reproduce or publish material from the Brydon Smith fonds must be obtained from the National Gallery of Canada Library and Archives.

Finding aids: Box list available.

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Administrative Information

Processing Information

Collection arranged and described by Philip Dombowsky in 2013.

Preferred Citation

[Title of item], Brydon Smith fonds, National Gallery of Canada Library and Archives.

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Contact Information

Reference Services
Library and Archives 
National Gallery of Canada 
380 Sussex Drive 
Ottawa, Ontario 
K1N 9N4 

T 613-714-6000 ext. 6323 

[email protected]

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Box List

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