Robert Annand
“I enjoy painting with lines and a rather fluid paint effect. My feelings mean more about my painting that the accuracy of the eye. The final effect is usually a head or a figure that may have come about because I had a feeling to paint an ear or a back.”
Robert Annand is a painter from the Maritimes renowned for the expressionistic handling of his subject matter, studies in oil and acrylic of figures, landscapes and nature.
Born in 1923 in central Nova Scotia in the town of Truro, Annand studied at Mount Allison University under the post-impressionist English landscape painter and illustrator, Stanley Royle.
Following his service in the Second World War, he then studied at the Ontario College of Art in Toronto. While there, he received support and encouragement from Douglas Duncan, who opened the Picture Loan Society in Toronto in 1936. With Duncan’s assistance, Annand travelled to Mexico where he studied mural painting techniques.
Annand’s work was included in the first Biennial of Canadian Painting at the National Gallery of Canada in 1955. In 1983, the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia produced a major exhibition of his work entitled, “Robert Annand: A Retrospective,” which went on to tour the Maritimes.
He has exhibited extensively in both solo and group shows throughout the Maritimes and in travelling exhibitions throughout Canada. His work is held in many private and public collections, including the National Gallery of Canada, Canada Council Art Bank, Art Gallery of Nova Scotia, Acadia University Art Gallery and the Nova Scotia Art Bank.
Robert Annand currently lives in Ottawa.