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Art at Queen's Park: The Macdonald Block - Indian Legends - Aba Bayefsky Title Banner

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Aba Bayefsky was born in Toronto in 1923 and died there in 2001. He studied at the Toronto Central Technical School and at the Académie Julien in Paris. In 1944, he was appointed Official War Artist for Canada, in Europe. Bayefsky received a French Government Scholarship in 1947 and a Canada Council Fellowship for travel in India in 1958. After spending some time in Japan, Bayefsky became interested in the art of “tattoo”. Bayefsky’s paintings of Toronto’s Kensington Market area are also well-known. The artist was a member of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts, the Canadian Society of Painters in Water Colour (Pres., 1956-57), the Canadian Group of Painters (Pres., 1962-63), the Canadian Society of Graphic Artists (Pres., 1956-57) and the Federation of Canadian Artists (Pres., Ontario Region 1949-53). He taught at the Ontario College of Art from 1956 to 1988.

Indian Legends was produced in acrylic polymer on plaster. The mural conveys the eeriness of a visionary experience in its whitened-blue colour scheme. Bayefsky described the subject matter as a synthesis of the natural and supernatural forces in Canadian Indian mythology.

Indian Legends, 1968 - Aba Bayefsky

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Indian Legends, 1968
Aba Bayefsky
acrylic polymer on plaster
Government of Ontario Art Collection, 619777

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