Support needed for project to commemorate Fort Macleod artist Annora Brown

JOYCE SASSE – GAZETTE CONTRIBUTOR
Annora Brown was a passionate conservationist, an accomplished historian and educator, and a prolific artist.
The work she produced between 1930 and 1960 was of the highest quality. It was about the life and landscape of southwestern Alberta.
Then, because of diminished health, she had to leave her home in Fort Macleod and retire to the Saanich Peninsula on Vancouver Island.
Many of her paintings hang in private homes, offices and galleries.
Glenbow Museum Archives’ collection of 260 paintings of flora, landscape and Blackfoot culture have only recently been photographed, digitized, and made available to the public as images and prints. They are pristine in quality and a reminder of the unique contribution this gifted artist has bequeathed.
Little has been done since her retirement in 1965 to celebrate her work and identify her legacy — until now.
In conjunction with the Fort Macleod Library, I am announcing the launching of an “Annora Brown Life and Legacy (2017) Project.”
And you, the citizens of southern Alberta, are invited to participate in this project.
I’m calling for “Do Crews” (of individuals or groups) to volunteer to help search out the legacy aspects of this woman’s multi-faceted life.
Through the year we will collect and collate these learnings, try to find her diaries and sketch books, make an inventory of privately owned paintings, and seek out the numerous ways we can name and celebrate her legacy.
Whatever your interest — be it conservationist, artist, educator, citizen — we need your help. Bring your Web-building and social media outreach skills so we can fan the flames that bring this person’s “life and legacy” back to life.
Our Annora Brown is a national treasure. As part of our Canada 150 celebrations we need to share this wonderful story.
Over the next several weeks, watch this “Legacy Learnings” column as I suggest how each of us, sharing our interests and skills, can fashion for ourselves a nurturing and nourishing aura of rediscovery.
jsasse@telusplanet.net