Featured Canadian Artist of the Day

Portrait of Frances Holgate

Lilias Torrence Newton c. 1925

Part of an important group of women artists to emerge from Montreal between the wars, Lilias Torrance Newton was one of Canada's most successful and respected portrait painters. In some 300 portraits of friends, fellow-artists and leading Canadian figures, she conveyed sympathy for her subjects and an understanding of character. Of her subjects, it was her intimate circle that inspired her best work, notable for its informality and sometimes unconventional poses. Newton was the first Canadian to paint portraits of Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip.