Arts Extravaganza

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The Haliburton Highlands Arts Extravaganza held at Sir Sam's Ski Chalet on Saturday October 19th, benefited the HHHS Foundation "Here For You in the Highlands" Campaign for diagnostic imaging. The extraordinary event, organized by Chris Bishop and several volunteers raised a net of $71,000! The crowd of 140 people were very generous bidding on silent, live, and online auction items. They also enjoyed delicious appetizers and the great music of Carl Dixon. Highlights include the online auction of the Ethel Curry painting donated by Don and Sheila Popple ending in a last minute bidding war, the live auction had neighbours and friend fighting it out for the artwork donated by several noted artists as well as the book that started it all - the 1988 Haliburton Highlands coffee table books donated by Chris Bishop. Thank you to the organizing committee for bringing this community together and this event to life. And a huge thank you to the artist, the business community, the sponsors and donors for your incredible support.

Online Auction for original Ethel Curry painting sold for $7,100!

Ethel Curry Painting ONLINE Auction ended on October 19 at 7pm with a nail biting bidding war! The auction was for a painting of a downtown Haliburton scene by Ethel Curry, Haliburton’s best-known painter, valued at over $10,000. “Brick House on Highland Street” from 1932 is generously donated by Don and Sheila Popple with all proceeds to support the HHHS Foundation Here for You Campaign.

Information about Artists & Artworks in the Live Auction

Download information about the artists and the artworks to be in the LIVE auction on October 19th.

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Ethel Curry headshot with her head back and sunglasses on

Chris Bishop notes, "One of my best memories of Ethel Curry was when I was about 8 years old. She had taken a group of eight of her nieces and nephews on a spring walk in the fields behind the top of Riverside Dr. There was still some snow on the ground and Ethel lit a fire, boiled some maple syrup she had brought with her, and once heated poured the maple syrup onto the snow. She gave us each a twig which we rolled into the syrup. This was my first introduction to maple taffy on snow!"

Brick House on Highland Street painting by Ethel Curry, streetscape in the snow

Her Painting “Brick House on Highland Street” from 1932, is of the brick house on built in 1903 (there is also a sketch of a funeral procession on the back of the painting from Evergreen cemetery) and was purchased in 1957 by the Brohm Family. Currently this building on Highland St is operated as Country Pickens owned by Laurie Bonfield, nee Brohm.

The painting is 13.5 x 11.5 inches and graciously donated by Don and Sheila Popple. Ethel Curry was Sheila’s Aunt.

Ethel Curry Biography

Ethel Luella Curry was born in 1902 in a log cabin at Irondale in Ontario’s Haliburton Highlands. At age four she is standing on a raft being towed by a tugboat across Miskwabi Lake looking after the family cow for a household move to the tiny village of Haliburton. Dirt poor, the family of four that includes her father and his pregnant wife, is off on an open-ended mission to secure a better life.

Fast forwarding thirty years from that pivotal event, replete with lack of promise as it may have appeared in the saga of this pioneering Ontario Family, the Canadian Art Community would come to refer to the area as “Curry Country”. By then, that rare accolade had to come to be hers as a result of her impassioned portrayals of Haliburton’s rugged landscape, her many sketches and paintings of its pristine beauty and her eagerness to have her fellow students and faculty, which included many of the Group of Seven at the Ontario College of Art (OCA), see it and paint it first hand.

Ethel became Haliburton’s best ambassador, eagerly and generously inviting friends and artists to stay at her family home or logging camps.

1924-25-- Ethel attends OCA and gets her first-year certificate
1925-26 --Teaches in a one-room Haliburton School
1927-28 --Returns to OCA for Second year
1929 - Ethel is awarded a complete Third Year Certificate at OCA
1930 - Ethel completes fourth year courses with honours

Ethel Curry instructs and teaches courses at Northern Vocational School (NVS) from 1936- 1965. In her later years at NVS she teaches Clay modeling.

She travels the country painting with many contemporary artists and Group of Seven members. Doris McCarthy, her close friend, spends a lot of time painting with her in Haliburton and across the country from the Rocky Mountains to Gaspe and many locations in between. Doris in those days and for many years to follow had the reputation as Canada’s best female painter!

In 1965, Ethel Curry retires and moves to her retirement house in Haliburton.

April 27, 2000 Ethel Luella Curry dies at the age of 97

One of her students Mary (Kendall) Percival from Northern Vocational School, to be renamed in 1955 to Northern Technical Commercial School, remembers Ethel as a “fabulous teacher who taught me so many wonderful things. A lot of my success comes from her”. From her love of the outdoors, she knew that freeing students from the classroom would stimulate their imaginations.

https://www.32auctions.com/EthelCurry

Poster for HH Art Extravaganza, all details available on the website.

Haliburton Highlands Arts Extravaganza

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