Mr. Weir’s intention was to collect a broad survey of the art created in Canada from its earliest days. He acquired some 160 works that illustrate the immediate area around Niagara Falls, as well as works that show the history, development, and personalities of Upper and Lower Canada in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
The collection contains pieces by many of the important Canadian painters and sculptors who worked before and into the early years of the twentieth century, including Cornelius Kreighoff, Paul Kane, Marc-Aurèle de Foy Suzor-Coté, Tom Thomson and members of the Group of Seven.
Exhibits are changed annually, with almost 200 artworks on display each year. Of the approximately 1,000 pieces of fine art in the collection, almost seventy percent are Canadian. The other thirty percent is made up of works by American and European artists, including pieces by Jacob Epstein, Augustus John, and others. Paintings, drawings, prints and sculpture are included in our holdings.
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