[img_inline align=”right” src=”http://padnws01.mcmaster.ca/images/harris2.jpg” caption=”Robert Harris, Cove, n.d., Oil on pressed board, 13.7 x 21.3 cm, collection of McMaster University”]The latest exhibition of Canadian art at the McMaster Museum of Art is the direct result of a student's outstanding art history paper. When Mira Radanovic, a fourth-year McMaster humanities student majoring in art history and English, submitted her essay, The Resurrection of Robert Harris, she expected it to be read only by her professor. Instead, it inspired an exhibition in the Museum's Togo Salmon Gallery and an eight-page brochure.

“Mira's research demonstrates the power of revisionist thinking and illustrates how a methodology of deconstruction can question the art historical canon. It is the kind of knowledge production the Museum of Art supports,” says Alexandria Pierce, acting director/curator of the Museum.

Radanovic's paper was noticed by Pierce while enrolled in her seminar entitled Introduction to Museum Studies, a credit course in the Department of Art History. Many of the students in the course completed research valuable to the Museum of Art, Pierce adds.

Welsh-born Canadian painter Robert Harris (1849-1919) is best known for his portrait paintings including The Fathers of Confederation 1883, and he also produced a large body of genre scenes and landscapes. Although he was one of the founding members of the Royal Canadian Academy in 1880 and a strong proponent of Canadian artists, within 50 years of his death his legacy was in jeopardy. Radanovic uses Harris as a case study to explore a curator's power to make or break an artist's reputation and even to rewrite art history.

Twelve of McMaster's 28 paintings by Harris are included in the exhibition, on view until Nov. 14.

The McMaster Museum of Art is located on the campus of McMaster University at the corner of Sterling Street and University Avenue. Admission to the Museum and this special presentation is pay-what-you-can with a suggested donation of $2. Students, seniors and members are free. Museum Hours: Tuesday – Friday 11-5; Sunday 12-5. Phone: 905-525-9140 ext. 23081. Fax: (905)527-4548. E-mail: museum@mcmaster.ca. Web site: www.mcmaster.ca/museum