What's on at the National Gallery of Canada

Ottawa Travel Guide

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Monday, 24 September 2012 15:53

From photography and contemporary video art to classic paintings and sculptures, the National Gallery of Canada is a gem among Ottawa's museums. Anyone who travels to Ontario for a taste of the capital's culture can spend hours touring the city, and if they want an even more comprehensive glance into the Great White North's historic past, present and future, then a visit to this museum should definitely be a part of their itinerary.

Current exhibitions
Until December 21 of this year, the National Gallery of Canada will showcase just how much effort it took for the library of the gallery to get to where it is today. With the help of Eric Brown, the first director of the Gallery, the museum has grown to house thousands of books and archival materials. The exhibition, titled Seeds of a Collection: The Library 100 years ago, catalogues Brown's journey in creating a research department from scratch.

The Gallery is also running the exhibition Leviathans of the Sky: Photographs of Dirigibles from the National Gallery of Canada, which is a visual presentation of aviation history from the early 20th century to the 1970s. Numerous types of crafts, from jets and hovercrafts to gyrocopters and planes, show human fascination with flight over the years, and how man has contributed to changing the way people travel. This exhibition will be held until January 13.

Future exhibitions
Canadian-born Margaret Watkins was a brilliant advertising and marketing photographer, using her talents to compose stark images for companies based in New York City in the 1920s. She helped contribute to the shift from pictorialism to modernism, and beginning on October 5, those who travel to Canada to visit the Gallery will have a chance to see dozens of her works. The exhibition, Domestic Symphonies, will display her photographs, as well as prints and drawings she scrawled before composing the final images. This show will run until January 13 as well.

Permanent exhibitions
Throughout the year, visitors have the opportunity to see hundreds of pieces of art spanning from the time when First Nations were the sole residents of Ottawa to the modern day, when contemporary artists are trying to comment on their personal identity through art. Whether travellers are interested in photography, historical artifacts or religious paintings, they can easily spend several hours wandering through the Gallery and still come back year after year to find something new.