The series consists of documents about the life and work of York Wilson created and compiled by Lela Wilson, arranged chronologically within three groups.
The first group of material consists of drafts and preliminary texts for Lela Wilson's biography, 'York Wilson: His life and work 1907-1984'. The drafts include material that was cut from the published version, a copy of which is included in the series.
The second group of material consists of contributions to biographical dictionaries, such as 'Canadian who's who', 'Accademia Italia', the 'Dictionary of international biography', 'Printworld' and 'Who's who in american art', as well as material prepared for a proposed documentary film on York Wilson.
The third group of material consists of exhibition, inventory and bibliographical lists prepared by Lela Wilson from ca. 1984 to the mid 1990s: the bibliographies provide a comprehensive listing of articles published about York Wilson and his work; the exhibition lists provide a chronology of all of the major exhibitions, solo and group, in which Wilson's work was represented; and a chronological sales inventory provides information on works sold. There are also alphabetical sales inventories recording, by title of work or name of buyer, detailed information about each of Wilson's artworks, including medium, dimensions, the name of the dealer who sold the work, the year in which it was sold, the price, and name of buyer.
A small amount of additional material received in 2006 includes additional drafts of chapters on Lela Wilson's biography of York Wilson and further inventories of Wilson's serigraphs and lithographs. Of note are two sales ledgers, documenting the painter's sales though 1942 to 1982. These additional records are contained in volume 424 under the Archival Reference number R4154.
