Views from the Blue House: The Remai Modern Collection

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Henri Leopold Masson, “The Blue House,” 1947

oil on canvas. (The Mendel Art Gallery Collection at Remai Modern. Gift of H. S. Southam, 1947.)

Opening Reception: January 28 at 1:00PM–4:00PM

Over the past six decades, Remai Modern, and its predecessor, the Mendel Art Gallery, have been building a public art collection. Modest in its origin, the collection stems from a single gift: Henri Masson’s small oil painting The Blue House, donated by H. S. Southam to the Saskatoon Art Centre in 1947.  

“When the Mendel Art Gallery opened in 1964, curator-director John Climer joked that the Gallery’s permanent collection was so small that he moved in with one painting under each arm,” former staff member, Helen ‘Bubs’ Coleman recounted in her book, Dreaming a Gallery. By the time Remai Modern opened its doors some 50 years later, the collection had grown exponentially, and now numbers more than 8,000 works.  

Using Masson’s painting as a starting point, Views from the Blue House looks to the past and future of Remai Modern’s diverse collection and highlights the influences and ideas that have given the collection its current shape. The exhibition draws out the many narratives, histories, and perspectives tied to the collection and invites visitors to find their own stories and relationships within these works.