Title based on the following caption from the NFB Photo Story: Veteran painter A. Y. Jackson has been an experimenter, inspiration and creative force in the Canadian art world for well over half a century. One of the originals of the now famous "Group of Seven", Jackson from the first firmly believed that if painters were to capture the spirit and shape of the vast expanse that was Canada they would have to break with European traditions and develop a style in keeping with the bold outline and vivid colouring of the vigorous young country. In the course of his long and productive career Jackson has lived to see his work, once bitterly attacked by critics and public alike, reach the pinnacle of critical acclaim and public acceptance. He has travelled and sketched in every region of the country with the vigorous zest of an explorer and the fresh, keen vision of a creative artist. He has taken his themes generally from the pioneer and wilderness fringes of Canada: the colourful habitant towns of rural Quebec, sparkling lakes of the Algoma district of Ontario, fur-trading posts of Baffin Land, broad sweeps of prairie and valleys of the Rockies. If he took liberties in setting down what he saw, it was always to make it more meaningful, to bring form into the chaotic wilderness of Canada's northland or to breathe new life into the peaceful beauty of the Canadian countryside. His work is known and admired by countless thousands of his fellow countrymen who recall his paintings of wind-lashed pines, rock-encircled lakes, turbulent rivers and snow-covered, rolling hills as authentic symbols of the Canadian scene. The big, unknown country the poets wrote about has been captured by Jackson's bold brush strokes with never-to-be forgotten vividness and grandeur.
