RICHARD KARON SERIES STILL ONE OF MY FAVORITE BIOGRAPHIES - AND AN INTERNATIONAL TRIBUTE TO A FINE LANDSCAPE ARTIST
RE-VISITING THE WORK OF A MUSKOKA ARTIST, WHO ADORED THE SCENERY OF LAKE OF BAYS TOWNSHIP
I like Richard Karon paintings because they are honest depictions of nature as he witnessed it, on his excursions to find the most interesting vantage points. He was never so foolish, as to think of himself as a great artist, and he made no foray into any debate, that would compare his art to others. He was confident with his palette knife, but he was haunted by self doubt, seeing each panel as a challenge to improve upon the one immediately before. Yet he knew what he needed to capture, to make his panels mean something more, than simply art pieces to match the color scheme of a livingroom or cottage wall. These were his interpretations, the result of his profound interest in Muskoka, and like a short story, each has a story-line attached, that gradually, over time, becomes obvious to whoever owns the subject piece. I find it remarkable, that a man who knew so much suffering, and saw it up close during the years of occupation, in his homeland, Poland, could liberate his soul to paint such uplifting and inspirational panels for our great benefit.
I've been thinking all week, about Richard Karon Jr., who I haven't seen in a few years, dating back to the occasion when I wrote the biography of his artist father, also named Richard. Richard Karon was, for a time, one of Muskoka's best known, and prolific artists. He painted the scenes around his Township of Lake of Bays studio, while he was working from his home studio near Baysville. I have long admired his art work, but more so, Karon's passion for this region of Ontario. In many ways, I have tried through the years, since I was first introduced to his work, back in the early 1970's, to mirror his depictions of the district, but not in paint. I have tried to replicate the passion he had for capturing landscapes, of the township, and region, via editorial copy, and I've never once felt I reached his capability to represent it, as his palette knife sculpted vibrant colors.
As has happened many times before, since commencing the biography quite a few years back, I suddenly got an email last evening from young Richard, who has moved back to Ontario, after a several year stint on the West Coast. When we do connect, we usually have stories to share about discovering additional canvases his father painted, found in curious places around the province, and sometimes under unusual circumstances. It is in the spring of the year, I think most of the artist Karon, because it was the time of year I felt, working on his biography, that always seemed to awaken something in him, a sort of sleeping creative giant, that was most prolific for him, when the land was reawakening after the long, snow-laden, bitter winter season. I have always enjoyed my most prolific writing periods in the spring and autumn, as did Mr. Karon, in his choice of artistic expressions.
As with most years, even before I had written the first paragraph of Karon's biography, I was getting five to ten requests each year, from Karon painting owners, asking for more information about the work they possessed. Seeing as I had written many feature articles for local publications, about Richard Karon's early painting years in Muskoka, it sort of stuck, that I was the go-to writer for this biographical information. When the younger Richard Karon agreed to co-produce a more complete biography of his father's work, it established once and for all, that I was going to be an ongoing source of information about the Lake of Bays artist. I was good with this task. I continue to get the same number of information requests each year, yet only several will ask for a valuation, sometimes just for insurance purposes. Occasionally I will get a request for evaluation, and the last one I did, was for someone in British Columbia, who had just purchased one from a regional antique dealer. They had no plan to sell the painting, but just wanted to know its market value especially in Muskoka. It is true, that his work does sell for considerable more, when offered by either a Muskoka gallery or antique dealer. Most have read the biography posted online, and are just as fascinated as I have been, for all these years, about Richard's passion for the home region, which to me, emanates boldly from his panels, large or small.
I think Richard Karon Jr. and I are a wee bit surprised about how many of his fathers paintings are out there, in private and public collections, that we didn't know about previously; but feel the biography has had something to do with liberating new information, which we have been adding when possible. Richard has, since arriving back home, already connected with folks who have originals in their collections, and more stories coming from previously unknown sources, continually infilling the biography where it was deficient.
In respect to this, I have once again decided to re-run the Richard Karon series, which by the way, has gone international, in the past, especially with Richard's connection to Poland, dating back to its years of Nazi occupation beginning in 1939. It's a damn compelling story when it comes to learning how the artist escaped, with friends, from the his native country, immediately following the Second World War, arriving in North America ready to begin a new life, and expand his painting career that had begun in Europe. But what I enjoy the most, is knowing that this man, who most likely watched the execution of his own mother, at the hands of the Nazis, and the deaths of many in his home community, was able to find peace in the embrace of the Muskoka hinterland he so enjoyed portraying in his art work. It can be said, with considerable evidence, his years living and working in the Township of Lake of Bays, were some of the finest years of his career, and his family life, spent with his wife, and son, at their Baysville studio. Here now is part one, of my favorite biography, of which I've done more than a few, that reminds me what passion can overcome, when harnessed as creative enterprise. Enjoy.
Richard Karon and his art, will never cease to remind me of what passion can accomplish in this world. We need many more passionate people to safeguard this magnificent hinterland from the ravages of future development, grossly unsuited to the landscape.
A FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION, THE MUSKOKA LAKELAND
THE BIOGRAPHY OF CANADIAN LANDSCAPE PAINTER, RICHARD KARON
"There will be a one-man art show in North Bay. The artist is a quiet, unassuming professional Canadian Master, and his first show will be his first this far north," reported an early 1970's news feature, published in the North Bay Nugget. "In 1962, he left the bustle of city life for the Muskoka area, and began to devote all his time to painting. It was in this scenic part of Ontario that he began to capture the beauty of the northern landscape in his own rare style of palette-knife painting. Richard Karon's brilliant color combinations and versatility of styles have set him apart from many other artists favoring the more realistic landscape form. The years spent in Muskoka have enabled Richard to capture the area's outstanding spectrum of colors and magnificent sunsets of this favored land."
INTRODUCTION
There will be some who read this brief biography, possibly those who knew his work intimately, studied with him, or joined him as participating members on the Muskoka Autumn Studio Tour, back in 1979 and 1980, who may rightly question, why it was deemed important enough to write such a biography in the first place. Was Richard Karon's art work amongst the best ever created in our region of Ontario? Could he be of the accomplishment, with his landscape art, that he might one day soon, be welcomed into the McMichael Gallery, or his work sought out for the permanent collections of the Art Gallery of Ontario, or the National Archives? Was he good enough, during the peak of his craft, to have earned the respect today of major art auctioneers in this country? The answer to each question, to be fair, is "no." He wasn't the finest or most accomplished artist to paint in the District of Muskoka. His work might never be purchased and exhibited by any major art gallery in this country. It is only slightly possible at this point in history, that Richard Karon originals will ever set auction records, as compared to the most noted and celebrated artists in Canada.
This biography will be interpreted by some readers as a tragic story. Others will find the story uplifting and inspirational. Despite the hardships the artist endured, the freedom he found through art, and what he experienced of paradise, in these healing woods of Muskoka, was painted into his art panels. Although he did not live and paint here for decades, as some artists can claim, or have generations of family rooted in the lakeland, his work, none the less, is highly representative of the kindred spirit of nature, he found so alluring and powerful. I have communicated with quite a number of people, from around Muskoka, who own Karon originals, and all have confessed their respect for his interpretations of the region. They've have generously offered to share the images of paintings in their private collections, and provided important insights about how they themselves, feel about Karon's relationship with nature. These are not gushing testimonials. They are honest and humble assessments, of how they have lived, for many years, in the company of these paintings. They have confessed nothing more, or less, than getting a "good" and "contenting feeling," seeing these art pieces day after day. They haven't sent me a single request for an evaluation, of how much these same paintings might be worth on the open market. They consider these paintings to be heirloom items, and some who have contacted me, admit they have already passed some of their Karon landscapes to family members as keepsakes. As I have been regularly communicating with the artist's son, through the past months of research, stories like this mean a great deal to him. Knowing there are people who bought his father's paintings in the 1960's to the mid 1980's, who still find them as attractive now, as they were when first acquired. Richard Karon Jr., was only seven when his father died of lung cancer. So this biography has been a journey of discovery, as much as a text to be published as reference, to assist future art researchers. I have passed on each of the emails to Richard, who has added these kind notes, and generous offers, to his own scrap-book of his father's life.
I have worked on many biographies since the late 1970's, including published work on the career of Bracebridge artist, Robert Everett, (Muskoka Today), and pioneer artist, Ada Florence Kinton, of Huntsville, "Muskoka Sun, Muskoka Today, and Curious; the Tourist Guide," but I have not had one that was so dimensionally intriguing and challenging. Admittedly it is a story that keeps butting up against what most would consider "the tragic," and some readers will feel the story ended as it began…..with misfortune and tragedy. Yet there is something that has held my attention to Richard Karon, that goes back to his own early days painting in Muskoka. Not only had my father Ed, worked with him on the construction of his home, studio and gallery, in Baysville, as a lumber agent, but some of the first news stories I wrote, for the Muskoka press, were about Richard Karon exhibitions; one I remember, that was to be held on Bigwin Island. Some of the first paintings I owned, were Karon landscapes. More than this however, is the fact, my own Muskoka impressions, in part, came as a young writer, who just happened to have a passion for art. I desired the work of regional artists, as I continue to this day. Truthfully, I was living a lonely life, in a tiny, sparsely furnished apartment in uptown Bracebridge……, feeling the inadequacy of a reporter's wage, but having several Karon paintings, my mother gave me, hanging above the desk that I wrote-at, on most quiet nights away from the busy newsroom. I found an escape in his art work, that he celebrated daily, living in the lush wreathing of Muskoka woods, in his Baysville home and studio. At a time when I first began writing my own landscape, pieces about Muskoka, which has been part of my editorial provenance for the past thirty-five years, it was seeded back then, when his paintings were my constant, obliging companions. So when his son emailed me, about the possibility we might partner, to compose this biography, I was understandably pleased the circle had been completed.
Richard Karon chose art and nature to escape from realities that fettered him back to his youth in Poland. His were not the childhood memories we can easily relate. Why would he need to escape at all? What was it about art that offered him this unspecified liberation? What did it mean to him in later life? Did he interpret nature as his protector? His muse? Please enjoy this humble offering, as a long overdue memorial tribute, to a friend of Muskoka.
Artist Richard Karon, 1928-1987.
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