Memorial Art Gallery

In March of 1919, students at Nutana Collegiate (called Saskatoon Collegiate Institute until 1923) announced they would establish a memorial of 29 large photographs of the alumni soldiers who died in the First World War. Principal Alfred J. Pyke instead suggested creating a Memorial Art Gallery that consisted exclusively of paintings by Canadian artists. It would be a living memorial to foster patriotism in students through knowledge and appreciation of Canadian art. They would purchase one painting by a different artist for each fallen soldier.

To raise money, students formed the Collegiate Institute Memorial Stock Company and sold stocks for fifty cents each. Four thousand students purchased stock in the company. Male and female students raised funds through babysitting, washing dishes and laundry, sawing wood and selling papers. The Memorial Art Gallery Fund was created with the money raised.

Two student groups regularly contributed to the Fund: the Pauline Club and the Non Nobis Club. The Pauline Club was a female operetta group, staged multiple shows annually in Saskatoon and contributed a percentage of their proceeds. Formed in 1915, the Non Nobis Club was a women’s group that hoped to “serve the school and country” during wartime. They purchased ten dollars' worth of shares in the joint-stock company in 1919. On Field Day in 1927, they donated their proceeds from serving tea and selling Nutana memorabilia to the public.

The first six paintings were acquired in 1919: William Greason’s October - dedicated to Private Harry Jack Cameron; Hervert Sidney Palmer's Hunting Country - dedicated to Private George Charles Geoffrey Dean; Harry Britton’s March Thaw in Ontario - dedicated to Private Richard Edmund Kreutzwieser; Alexander M. Flemming's The Credit River was dedicated to Private Charles Milton Warner; William St. Thomas Smith's A Fishing Village - dedicated to Private Richard Gordon O’Leary and Florence Carlyle's Ave Maria - dedicated to James Gordon Searles. They were hung in the auditorium on the top floor of the school.

Principal Alfred Pyke left the university in 1923 to join the faculty of the University of Saskatchewan and A.W. Cameron became the principal. As former vice-principal he was already involved with the gallery, so there was little disruption to purchasing the rest of the paintings. 

John Beatty's The North Country - dedicated to Private Grenville Carson Hopkins; Sir Edmund Grier's Spirit of Youth - dedicated to Lieutenant Arthur S.K. Lloyd; Laura Lyall's Lullably - dedicated to Private Roy Eugene Shuttleworth and Marion Long's Pauline - dedicated to Lieutenant William Douglas Aird - these companion paintings were examples of the “school spirit” that pervaded modern high school culture postwar.

Emile Walters’ Winter - dedicated to Private Skuli Lindal and Apple Blossoms dedicated to Private Jacob Lindal: Walters was a young artist, just thirty-one when he made contact with Cameron and the Memorial Art Gallery. He asked that the two canvases be dedicated to the Lindal brothers. Walters had met them many years earlier when he lived in Saskatoon and had a friendship with Jacob, keeping in touch with him until he left for war. 

Many artists reduced their prices as a sign of respect for the fallen men of Nutana. The final acquisition, Frederick Challener’s Off to Flanders’ Fields, depicting ships sailing Canadian troops overseas to England in preparation for training, was dedicated to Private Robert Peveral McCordick.

The gallery is a living memorial that honours the fallen and ensures post-war generations understand its forebears’ sacrifices. On 11 November 1927, a ceremony marked the completion of the Memorial Art Gallery's acquisitions.

Alumni are still very involved with the Memorial Art Gallery and continue fundraising to send pieces of the collection for restoration.

[plaque]
NUTANA COLLEGIATE
MEMORIAL ART GALLERY
FOUNDED 1919

TO REMEMBER EACH OF 29 STUDENTS
WHO LOST THEIR LIVES
IN WORLD WAR I
AND
"TO DEVELOP AN APPRECIATION OF
SACRIFICE AND SERVICE AND TO
DEVELOP AN AWARENESS OF VARIOUS
PHASES OF ART."

(FROM THE ORIGINAL SHARE CERTIFICATE)

PLACED HERE ON THE 65TH ANNIVERSARY
OF THE GALLERY.

[plaque]
NUTANA COLLEGIATE
MEMORIAL LIBRARY
AND
ART GALLERY

DEDICATED TO THE MEMORY OF THOSE
STUDENTS OF THIS COLLEGIATE WHO
DIED IN THE CAUSE OF FREEDOM IN
WORLD WARS I AND II

• THE
• ART GALLERY
• WORLD WAR I
• 1914 - 1918
• THE
• LIBRARY
• WORLD WAR II
• 1939 - 1945