Dorothy Knowles

Dorothy Knowles occupies an important place in the history of landscape painting. Working for more than seven decades in the male-dominated post-war envronment of Canadian painting, she developed a sustained examination of the prairie and parkland regions of Western Canada, producing paintings distinguished by their close observation of light, atmosphere, and seasonal change. Although her work emerged alongside the formal concerns of post-war modernism, Knowles remained committed to direct engagement with the landscape, shaping a body of work that bridged observational painting and colour field painting. After studying at the University of Saskatchewan, Knowles continued her education at Goldsmiths School of Art in London, England, before marrying William Perehudoff in Paris in 1951. An important turning point in her career came at the 1962 Emma Lake Artists' Workshop in northern Saskatchewan, where the critic Clement Greenberg encouraged her to remain committed to landscape painting at a time when hard-edge abstraction occupied a central place in modernist criticism. Knowles later worked alongside Kenneth Noland, whom influenced her approach towards applying paint in thin veils of shimmering hues. Over the following decades, Knowles developed a painterly approach grounded in established compositional traditions while informed by the direct observation and fluid handling associated with plein air painting. Her work reflected a sustained engagement with the landscapes of Western Canada, where she was born and spent most of her life, exploring the formal possibilities of colour, light, and spatial relationships through close attention to the particularities of place. Nikola Rukaj Gallery is pleased to represent the Dorothy Knowles Estate. Knowles received numerous honours in recognition of her contributions to Canadian art. Her work was included in the National Gallery of Canada's 7th Biennial Exhibition of Canadian Painting (1968), affirming her place within the national art landscape. In 1977, her work was selected for the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden's exhibition 14 Canadians: A Critic's Choice, organized by the Smithsonian Institution. She was subsequently represented in Five From Saskatchewan (1983), a traveling exhibition that toured London, Paris, and Brussels, She was appointed a Member of the Order of Canada in 2004, received the Saskatchewan Order of Merit in 1987, was awarded the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal in 2012, and received the Canada 150 Medal in 2017. Her work entered the collections of major public institutions in Canada and the United States, including the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, National Gallery of Canada, the Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal, Art Gallery of Alberta, Winnipeg Art Gallery, Vancouver Art Gallery, The McMichael Canadian Art Collection,  The Glenbow Museum, Kamloops Art Gallery, Portland Art Museum, and the Winnipeg Art Gallery, among others. In 2010, the McMichael mounted a solo exhibition titled Land Marks, which travelled to the Moose Jaw Museum. In 2018, the Remai Modern also mounted a major retrospective of her work. Nikola Rukaj Gallery is pleased to represent the Dorothy Knowles Estate.