Takao Tanabe

Takao Tanabe, CM OBC RCA (born 16 September 1926) is a Canadian artist who painted abstractly for decades, but over time, his paintings became nature-based.

Takao Tanabe
Born
Takao Izumi

(1926-09-16) 16 September 1926
Seal Cove, British Columbia, Canada
EducationWinnipeg School of Art, Winnipeg, Manitoba (1946–1949), studying with Lionel LeMoine FitzGerald, and Joseph Plaskett; Brooklyn Museum Art School, New York City, New York with Hans Hofmann (1951) and Reuben Tam (1951-1952); Central School of Arts and Crafts, London, UK (1953–1954); studied Sumi-e and calligraphy at Tokyo University in Japan
SpouseAnona Thorne
AwardsOrder of Canada, Order of British Columbia, Governor General's Awards in Visual and Media Arts; Audain Prize for Lifetime Achievement in the Visual Arts,
ElectedMember, Royal Canadian Academy of Arts

Biography

Born Takao Izumi in Seal Cove, today part of Prince Rupert, British Columbia,[1] the son of a commercial fisherman, where he was the fifth of seven children. Tanabe and his family were interned with other Japanese-Canadians in the British Columbia interior during World War II.[2] They were relocated first to a camp at Hasting Park in Vancouver and the Lemon Creek internment camp[3] in the Kootenays in the summer of 1942. Tanabe attended the Winnipeg School of Art, Winnipeg, Manitoba (1946–1949), studying with Lionel LeMoine FitzGerald, and Joseph Plaskett.[4] He then studied at the Brooklyn Museum Art School, New York City, New York with Hans Hofmann (1951) and Reuben Tam (1951-1952).[4] He received an Emily Carr Scholarship and went to the Central School of Arts and Crafts, London, UK (1953–1954) and during that time, travelled widely in Europe. From 1959 to 1960, he studied Sumi-e and calligraphy at Tokyo University in Japan on a Canada Council Scholarship.[4][2]

His works are in public and private collections, including the National Gallery of Canada, the Glenbow Museum, the Vancouver Art Gallery, the Canada Council Art Bank, the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria and the Art Gallery of Ontario.[5]

Career

His art has gone through different phases.[6] In his "inscapes" (he called his paintings after a term used by Gerald Manley Hopkins) of the late 1950s, Tanabe explored his memories of lit interiors, painting them abstractly and expressing them with calligraphic signs. From 1961 to 1968, Tanabe taught at the Vancouver Art School. In 1968, he worked in Philadelphia, moving in 1969 to New York City where he lived until 1972. In New York, he painted hard-edge geometric abstracts.[2] From 1973, he was head of the art program and artist-in-residence at the Banff Centre for the Arts. By then, he consciously considered landscapes as a subject, while progressively eliminating references to the specific.[7] In 1980, he returned to British Columbia where he lives and works on Vancouver Island. He is considered today a painter who primarily evokes the landscape of British Columbia in minimalist paintings.[8]

In 2005, a major retrospective of his work curated by Ian Thom[1] was organized and circulated by the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria and Vancouver Art Gallery.[9]

In 2014, Tanabe said:

...I try to avoid brush marks so that it looks as though the paint has just floated on...[10]

Awards

Selected publications
  • "Takao Tanabe" (2005), Ian M. Thom, Roald Nasgaard, Nancy Tousley, and Jeffrey Spalding, (Vancouver Art Gallery and Victoria Art Gallery) ISBN 9781553651413
  • "Chronicles of Form and Place : Works on Paper by Takao Tanabe" (2012), Darren J. Marten, Ihor Holibizky, Denise Leclerc (Burnaby Art Gallery) ISBN 9780980996296

References
  1. Brennan, Brian. "Takao Tanabe". www.gallerieswest.ca. Galleries West Magazine. Retrieved 10 April 2021.
  2. "Takao Tanabe". www.gallery.ca. National Gallery of Canada. Retrieved 10 April 2021.
  3. "HistoricPlaces.ca - HistoricPlaces.ca". www.historicplaces.ca. Retrieved 20 April 2023.
  4. Zemans, Joyce (2010). "Abstract and Non-Objective Art in English Canada". The Visual Arts in Canada: the Twentieth Century. Foss, Brian., Paikowsky, Sandra., Whitelaw, Anne (eds.). Don Mills, Ont.: Oxford University Press. p. 179. ISBN 978-0-19-542125-5. OCLC 432401392.
  5. Takao Tanabe. Takao Tanabe, Ian M. Thom, Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, Vancouver Art Gallery. Vancouver: Douglas & McIntyre. 2005. ISBN 1-55365-141-3. OCLC 60318949.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: others (link)
  6. "Takao Tanabe Speaks About His Art". www.youtube.com. You Tube, Jan 31, 2007. Archived from the original on 22 December 2021. Retrieved 10 April 2021.
  7. Murray, Joan (1999). Canadian Art in the Twentieth Century. Toronto: Dundurn. OCLC 260193722. Retrieved 10 April 2021.
  8. "Order of Canada, Takao Tanabe". archive.gg.ca/. Governor General of Canada. Retrieved 10 April 2021.
  9. "Takao Tanabe". mcmichael.com. McMichael Canadian Art Gallery. Retrieved 10 April 2021.
  10. Becky Rynor, "An Interview with Takao Tanabe". National Gallery of Canada Magazine, 21 July 2014.
  11. Order of Canada citation
  12. "Members since 1880". Royal Canadian Academy of Arts. Archived from the original on 26 May 2011. Retrieved 11 September 2013.
  13. "Takao Tanabe, Gathie Falk win $30K Audain Prize for art". CBC News. Retrieved 21 March 2017.
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