Greenefeather Original

Fred Greene was a member of the Shoal Lake First Nation, very near the Ontario/Manitoba border, just west of Lake of the Woods. His favourite pastimes were singing country tunes (he was pretty good, too!) and the love that made him famous: painting. In his younger years, he was a guide on the Lake. Even then he was finding unique ways of expressing his talent. He gave my mother, for whom he guided while she was a nurse with Indian Health back in the early 1950s, a horseshoe fungus, the underside of which was a beautiful pastel landscape by Fred’s hand. Fred was a very personable fellow. If you ran into him at a local dining establishment, he would often be happy to do an original on the spot – provided the restaurant had some paper plates on hand that he could use as a canvas!

Greenefeather is best known for the Winsor & Newton black gouache landscapes, delicately detailed with his Koh-i-noor pen and ink. Frequently the solitude of his vistas is broken with the addition of wild animals, but I think his best work leaves the  wildlife unseen. He knew his trees, their relationship to the land and their struggle against the elements, and he captures all of that perfectly on paper. His prints are still relatively common, but his originals are becoming more difficult to find.

Untitled Winter Scene, dated 1978, measures 12″ x 16″ (approx 30 x 40 cm) in its archival double mat; all ready to frame! ECB11850 $225.00