Taylor
Frederick Bourchier RCA
1906 - 1987
Fred Bourchier Taylor was born in Ottawa in 1906. In the 1930s and 1940s he became nationally known for his paintings and prints of war industry workers, street scenes of downtown Montreal and its urban architectural settings. In 1925, he enrolled at McGill University in Montreal to study architecture. In 1929, he began drawing lessons with Edmond Dyonnet.
In 1930, he received a scholarship to continue his studies in art in Europe. In 1931, he trained with Charles-Edouard Jeanneret, known as Le Corbusier, one of the pioneers of what is called "modern architecture" and he also studied art history at the Sorbonne. Back in Canada, Fred settled in Ottawa where he studied drawing and etching with Ernest Fosbery.
In 1951, Taylor had a solo exhibition at the Dominion Gallery, Montreal, where he exhibited 80 paintings depicting views of Montreal, Quebec, and Nova Scotia. From 1950 to 1953, he painted a series of works of art focusing on workers, such as fishermen, loggers and shore workers.
Between 1954 and 1959, Taylor began a series of long stays in Mexico with his second wife, the painter Nova Hecht, and in 1960, settled permanently in San Miguel de Allende. Suffering from arthritis, he began to explore screen printing. In 1963, after traveling in Europe for a few months, Taylor presented a solo exhibition of his paintings at The Artlenders gallery in Montreal where he showed Mexican street scenes, markets and portraits. He also began to sculpt bronze and stone at this time.
Between 1963 and 1973, he exhibited regularly in Montreal and Toronto, among others. In 1971, he donated 75 etchings to the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.
Throughout her long career, Taylor exhibited extensively in Canada, the United States, England and Mexico, and between 1932 and 1963 her work was the subject of 14 solo exhibitions. Fred Taylor died in San Miguel de Allende in 1987.
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