Charles Jones Way

Charles Jones Way (1834-1919) was another Canadian student of African American painter Robert Duncanson, travelling with Duncanson (as well as Allan Edson) to Europe after the Civil War. After meeting the Hudson River painter in 1863 C.J Way was inspired to break from his British aesthetic conditioning, focusing increasingly on the spirit of the sublime underlying the senses rather than the effects of the senses themselves. He was the founder of the Art Association of Montreal in 1860, and founder/President of the Society of Canadian Artists in 1867. After 25 years in Europe, C.J Way returned to Canada on the invitation of William van Horne (President of the Canadian Pacific Rail) in 1898 to travel and paint the Canadian frontiers on the Trans continental rail. While this series is praised as the most dramatic and inspired landscapes of Canada, they have nearly all been lost from public view, having been systematically purchased by private collectors and buried from public view. Due to the aborted development of Canada as a Promethean nation after the 1867 BNA act was passed to block the spread of Americanism on the Continent, Way’s maturation as a promethean artist seems also to have derailed quite a bit.

unnamed landscape
Activity by an Alpin Lake- 1873
Paysage du Chablais
Canadian scene with boats
Le Cervine
Landscape
Summer day in the Jura Mountains
he Aletsch Glacier seen from Bettmeralp
Valley
Verdun