"The Life and Art of George Fertig"

by

By Mona Fertig, Introduction by Peter Such

Mother Tongue Publishing Limited (Salt Spring Island, BC) 2010

Reviewed by Mary-Beth Laviolette

The Life of Art of George Fertig is the third book in the Unheralded Artists of BC series founded by Mona Fertig and her husband, Peter Hasse. As the series title suggests, it focuses on artists who never had much of a nod from critics, curators, influential gallerists and the public art institutions that establish a region’s history and its artists of merit through exhibitions, catalogues, collections, and institutional connections. In a 1966 review of Fertig’s work, Ian Wallace wrote that it’s always more difficult to form an opinion about any artist who “is working outside the current styles and is apart from of the main artistic community”. But many years later Roy Kiyooka wrote that he thought Fertig’s “haunting paintings remain memorable in my mind’s eye.”

Writing about Fertig’s life and art, his daughter Mona includes her own recollections and those of her father’s friends and colleagues, creating an engaging picture of post-war Vancouver and its evolution into a hip, counter-culture community in the 60s and 70s. But like many other growing arts centres, the city’s scene has also been cliquish, with only so much tolerance for different creative approaches.

Are there occasional moments of sour grapes in this part-biography and part-memoir? Yes. But on the whole, the writing is good and the book includes plenty of full-colour examples of Fertig’s work, along with some excellent research about the inspiration behind the artist’s dreamy, metaphysical paintings.