Lot 42: JOHN YOUNG JOHNSTONE 1887 - 1930

JOHN YOUNG JOHNSTONE 1887 - 1930 THE SCHOOL HOUSE AT JOACHIM signed and dated lower right J. Johnstone 1918 ; signed once, titled twice, once by the artist on the reverse oil on panel 22.2 by 29.9 cm. 8 ¾ by 11 ¾ in.

A.K. Prakash, John Young Johnstone Retrospective Exhibition, Galerie Walter Klinkhoff, Montreal, 2005, p. 3

Private Collection, Montreal

Johnstone painted this fine panel of St. Joachim, just east of Quebec City, in 1918, when he was fully experienced both technically and aesthetically. The streets, church, and houses of the village were often his subject. Like his countryman Morrice, who painted European cityscapes, Johnstone evoked an intimacy and a tenderness that has a melancholic feeling and his accuracy in drawing and tone is pitch perfect.

As A.K. Prakash notes in 'John Young Johnstone Retrospective Exhibition': "Like Maurice Cullen, he invested his subjects with a preternatural stillness...painting with the immediacy of his passions while reflecting influences from a variety of sources."