# Gordon Rayner > Mediated Wiki article. Canonical URL: https://mediated.wiki/source/Gordon_Rayner > Markdown URL: https://mediated.wiki/source/Gordon_Rayner.md > Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gordon_Rayner > Source revision: 1339217715 > License: Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/) {{short description|Canadian abstract painter (1935-2010)}} {{Use mdy dates|date=June 2020}} {{Infobox artist | name = Gordon Rayner | image = | image_size = | alt = | caption = | birth_name = | birth_date = {{birth date|1935|06|14}} | birth_place = [Toronto](/source/Toronto), [Ontario](/source/Ontario), Canada | death_date = {{death date and age|2010|09|26|1935|06|14|mf=y}} | death_place = Toronto, Ontario, Canada | nationality = | spouse = Kate Regan | field = [painter](/source/painter), sculptor, film-maker, print-maker, also teacher at Toronto's New School of Art (1965) | training = self-taught | works = | patrons = | awards = [Canada Council](/source/Canada_Council) Grants and Senior Fellowships (1961-1973); Toronto Outdoor Competition (1960), First prize for prints, 12th Winnipeg show (1970) | elected = }} '''Gordon Rayner''' (June 14, 1935 – September 26, 2010) was a Canadian [abstract expressionist](/source/Abstract_expressionism) [painter](/source/Painting). His way of creating art was idiosyncratic and characterized by constant innovation and often by transformation of his medium. Later, he integrated realism into his practice. == Biography == As a young person, Gordon Rayner learned to paint from his father, a commercial artist and weekend painter, and from his father's close friend, [Jack Bush](/source/Jack_Bush). He spent 17 years working in commercial art, starting with Bush's commercial art firm, Wookey, Bush and Winter. An exhibition of [Painters Eleven](/source/Painters_Eleven) in 1955, and especially the work of [William Ronald](/source/William_Ronald), which he visited with his friend, artist [Dennis Burton](/source/Dennis_Burton_(artist)), at Toronto's [Hart House](/source/Hart_House_(University_of_Toronto)) Gallery (today the Justina M. Barnicke Gallery, Art Museum at the [University of Toronto](/source/University_of_Toronto)) turned him towards abstraction {{sfn|Murray|1978|p=17–19}} as did visits to the Albright Knox Art Gallery in Buffalo (now called the [Buffalo AKG Art Museum](/source/Buffalo_AKG_Art_Museum)), to see artists such as [Willem de Kooning](/source/Willem_de_Kooning).John Bentley Mays, "Rayner exhibit recalls a crucial era for Toronto". Globe and Mail, July 19, 1980. Under the influence of the neo-Dada movement current in Toronto in the late 1950s and first half of the 1960s, Rayner began to combine found materials with his paintings.{{sfn|Murray|1978|p=22-26}} [[File:St Clair West Station art wall.JPG|alt=Mural by Rayner|left|thumb|''Tempo'', a mural by Rayner at Toronto's [St. Clair West station](/source/St._Clair_West_station)]] In 1966, he began a new period in his work centred around images of [Magnetawan](/source/Magnetawan), an area 200 miles north of Toronto, north of the [Muskoka District](/source/District_Municipality_of_Muskoka). It provided him with a favourite painting place in which he could experiment with materials and technique while demonstrating how to refer to nature without copying it in his work. To express his feelings, he used oblique references, a thick and expressionist technique, and sometimes found objects.{{sfn|Murray|1978|p=23-25}} These paintings were intuitive reinterpretations of landscapes dramatically conceived.{{sfn|Nasgaard|2008|p=237-239}} Rayner showed his work with Toronto's [Isaacs Gallery](/source/Avrom_Isaacs).{{Cite book|last=Bradfield|first=Helen|title=Art Gallery of Ontario: the Canadian Collection.|date=1970|publisher=McGraw-Hill of Canada|isbn=978-0-07-092504-5|location=Toronto|language=en|oclc=260161067}} For this reason, he has been called part of the Isaacs Group of artists, which include, among others, [Michael Snow](/source/Michael_Snow), [Joyce Wieland](/source/Joyce_Wieland), [John Meredith](/source/John_Meredith_(artist)) and [Graham Coughtry](/source/Graham_Coughtry). In the 1980s, his work shifted direction to a new interest in the figure. He began to reinvent this crucial subject of art for himself using dimensions of the inner, more spiritual self and obliquely explored realism in the context of the body, painting himself in inventive scenes. Some of these paintings are called the Oaxaca Suite, since Rayner lived in [Oaxaca](/source/Oaxaca) in southern Mexico in 1993 and 1994.{{cite web |last1=Rayner |first1=Gordon |title=Gordon Rayner |url=https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/gordon-rayner |website=www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca |access-date=2020-06-10}} On September 26, 2010, Gordon Rayner died suddenly at home in Toronto.{{Cite news |last=Rayner |first=Gordon |date=2010-09-30 |title=Obituary |publisher=Canadian press |agency=Toronto Star |url=https://www.thestar.com/entertainment/2010/10/13/gordon_rayner_the_last_picture_show.html |access-date=2020-06-10}} == Collections == *[Agnes Etherington Art Centre](/source/Agnes_Etherington_Art_Centre), Kingston{{sfn|MacDonald|1979|p=1954}} *[Art Gallery of Ontario](/source/Art_Gallery_of_Ontario), Toronto *[Art Gallery of Windsor](/source/Art_Gallery_of_Windsor){{sfn|MacDonald|1979|p=1954}} *[Art Institute of Chicago](/source/Art_Institute_of_Chicago){{cite web |title=Collection |url=https://www.artic.edu/artists/21441/gordon-rayner |website=www.artic.edu |publisher=Art Institute of Chicago |access-date=12 September 2025}} *The [Canada Council](/source/Canada_Council) Art Bank Collection{{sfn|MacDonald|1979|p=1954}} *The [Hirshhorn Museum](/source/Hirshhorn_Museum), Washington{{sfn|MacDonald|1979|p=1954}} *[MacKenzie Art Gallery](/source/MacKenzie_Art_Gallery), Regina{{sfn|MacDonald|1979|p=1954}} *[Montreal Museum of Fine Arts](/source/Montreal_Museum_of_Fine_Arts){{sfn|MacDonald|1979|p=1954}} *[Museum of Modern Art](/source/Museum_of_Modern_Art), New York{{sfn|MacDonald|1979|p=1954}} *[National Gallery of Canada](/source/National_Gallery_of_Canada), Ottawa{{Cite web|title=Gordon Rayner|url=https://www.gallery.ca/collection/artist/gordon-rayner|website=National Gallery of Canada|language=en|access-date=2020-06-10}} *[Philadelphia Museum of Art](/source/Philadelphia_Museum_of_Art){{sfn|MacDonald|1979|p=1954}} *[The Robert McLaughlin Gallery](/source/The_Robert_McLaughlin_Gallery), Oshawa{{cite web |last1=Rayner |first1=Gordon |url=https://rmg.minisisinc.com/m3online/scripts/mwimain.dll/41/1/0?SEARCH&SHOWSINGLE=Y&ERRMSG=[M3ONLINE]error.html |website=rmg.minisisinc.com |title=works in the collection |publisher=Robert McLaughlin Gallery, Oshawa |access-date=2020-06-10 |archive-date=October 14, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201014072001/https://rmg.minisisinc.com/m3online/scripts/mwimain.dll/41/1/0?SEARCH&SHOWSINGLE=Y&ERRMSG=%5BM3ONLINE%5Derror.html |url-status=dead }} *[Vancouver Art Gallery](/source/Vancouver_Art_Gallery){{sfn|MacDonald|1979|p=1954}} == Commissions == Rayner had numerous public commissions, among them mural ''Tempo'' (porcelain enamel on steel) for the Toronto Transit Commission, Spadina Subway line, St. Clair Station (1977).{{sfn|MacDonald|1979|p=1954}} == References == {{reflist}} === Further reading === *{{cite book |last1=Nasgaard |first1=Roald |title=Abstract Painting in Canada |year=2008 |pages=237–239|publisher=Douglas & McIntyre|isbn=9781553653943 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-18mk0_QWjoC |access-date=2020-08-18}} *{{cite book|last1=MacDonald|first1=Colin|title=A Dictionary of Canadian Artists, vol.7|date=1979|publisher=Canadian Paperbacks Publishing Ltd.|isbn=0-919554-13-X|edition=Third|url=https://search.library.utoronto.ca/details?250997&uuid=8586fc98-e5bd-4f7d-9f6e-ea34495703b6|access-date=2020-05-31|archive-date=June 10, 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200610175453/https://search.library.utoronto.ca/details?250997&uuid=8586fc98-e5bd-4f7d-9f6e-ea34495703b6|url-status=dead}} *{{cite book|last1=Murray|first1=Joan|title=Mnemonica, Gordon Rayner Retrospective|date=1978|publisher=Robert McLaughlin Gallery|location=Oshawa|pages=17–25|url=https://search.library.utoronto.ca/search?N=0&Ntx=mode+matchallpartial&Nu=p_work_normalized&Np=1&Ntt=joan%20murray%2C%20gordon%20rayner%20retrospective&Ntk=Anywhere|access-date=2020-06-10}} {{Authority control}} {{DEFAULTSORT:Rayner, Gordon}} Category:1935 births Category:2010 deaths Category:Painters from Toronto Category:20th-century Canadian painters Category:20th-century Canadian sculptors Category:Canadian male sculptors Category:20th-century Canadian male artists Category:20th-century Canadian artists Category:Canadian abstract artists Category:Canadian collage artists Category:Canadian muralists --- Adapted from the Wikipedia article [Gordon Rayner](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gordon_Rayner) by Wikipedia contributors ([contributor history](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gordon_Rayner?action=history)). 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