Artist John Kenneth Esler
Title Fire on the Mountain #47/50
Media colour etching on paper
Dated
1989
Size 13.75 x 17.75 in. / 34.9 x 45.1 cm.
Estimate $600 - $1,200
Notes
signed, titled, dated and numbered along bottom; unframed
Provenance
this work was generously donated by the artist's estate courtesy of J.D. Esler; proceeds will be donated to the Alberta University of the Arts (AUArts) Centennial Scholarships fund in celebration of the university's Centennial year. The Centennial Scholarships fund is a transformative initiative to provide future artists, craftspersons, and designers with tuition-free education. Centennial Scholarships will reduce financial barriers and provide students with a tuition-free year of study. For more information or to donate directly visit: auarts.ca/donate-now
Biographical Information
John Kenneth Esler ~ [1933-2001] Canadian ASA, CSGA, CPE, MSA, RCA
John Kenneth (J.K.) Esler was born in 1933 in Pilot Mound, Manitoba and attended the School of Art at the University of Manitoba, graduating in 1960. He continued studies there, receiving a Bachelor of Education degree in 1962, and in 1964, after a period of travel in Europe, took a teaching position at the Alberta College of Art and Design (now Alberta University of the Arts) in Calgary. He joined the faculty of the University of Calgary in 1968 where he taught intaglio printmaking, staying there until his retirement in the 1980s. Esler was well-known in the Calgary arts community, and did much to raise the profile of printmaking in the province. He played a major role in the expansion of the printmaking departments at AUArts and at the University of Calgary. Esler's works have been exhibited widely throughout Canada and abroad and he is represented in many public and private collections. His awards included the C.W. Jefferys' Award from the Canadian Society of Graphic Arts and the G.A. Reid Memorial Award from the Canadian Painter-Etchers and Engravers.
John Kenneth Esler had an irreverent, somewhat Dadaist sensibility which he expressed in his art and in his teaching methods. He encouraged his students to experiment, and to make art with a mind open to unexpected possibilities.
see 35 Years and 15 Minutes, prints by John Kenneth Esler, by S.Ford, Nickle Arts Museum, 1994;
biography and other examples in
Founders of the A.C.A., by V.Greenfield, pg.80;
Printmaking in Alberta 1945-1985, by B.Cochran, pg.66-69;
N.G.C. Vol.1, A-F, ed.C.Hill, pg.300; Dict. Of Canadian Artists, by C.MacDonald, Vol.1 pg.192;
Collector's Dictionary of Canadian Artists at Auction, by A.Westbridge, Vol.1, pg. 106, Westbridge Pub., 1999;
Manitoba Society of Artists by J.Stoppler, pg.158, the Manitoba Society of Artists, 2003;
Allgemeines Kunstler-Lexikon, Band 35, pg. 65, K.G. Saur Verlag Munchen-Leipzig, 1983-2009
listed on Artists in Canada, a Union List of Artists' Files, by National Gallery of Canada Library et al, Canadian Heritage Information Network [CHIN] website