TOM FORRESTALL (Estate), 1936-2024

TOM FORRESTALL (1936-2024), one of Canada's top realist painters, remained remarkably consistent in his work for over 65 years. Forrestall, like his teacher Alex Colville and his contemporaries Christopher Pratt and Mary Pratt, found his own route to painting that was relevant to him, crafting a personal approach that is less part of any defined group than it is a response to specific biographical and emotional facets of his life, depicting his immediate surroundings, filtered through his imagination and his sensibility.

A major retrospective of Tom Forrestall’s work was organized by the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia in 2008. The show subsequently travelled to Beaverbrook Art Gallery, Fredericton, New Brunswick; Confederation Centre of the Arts, Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island; the McMichael Canadian Art Collection, Kleinburg, Ontario and Owens Art Gallery at Mount Allison University, Sackville, New Brunswick – Forrestall’s alma mater.

A gift of 400 sketchbooks spanning a period of 70 years was donated by the artist to the Beaverbrook Art Gallery.

Forrestall’s works are held in many Canadian and international, public, corporate and private collections.