Claude Herbert Breeze

Claude Herbert Breeze

Claude Herbert Breeze, painter (b at Nelson, BC 9 Oct 1938). Breeze was taught by Ernest LINDNER in Saskatoon (1954-55) and then studied at Regina with Kenneth LOCHHEAD and Arthur MCKAY. After graduating in 1958, he spent a year at the Vancouver School of Art. One of the important West Coast painters, Breeze was the first in Canada to depict the violence shown by the media, especially television.

In many ways his work of the early 1960s, particularly his series Lovers in a Landscape, with its probing content and dry handling, anticipates the work of the young contemporary figure painters. Breeze has completed a number of lithographs based on his fascination with aikido, a Japanese martial art. In the late 80s, he began exploring computer-aided image formation. In Apr 1985 a large show of his work was held at Bau-Xi Gallery in Toronto. Claude Breeze was elected to the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts in 1974 and was awarded the Queen's Jubilee Medal in 1978. In addition to his many exhibitions, he has received several commissions, including from the Bank of Nova Scotia, the Pacific Centre Mall (Vancouver), the Toronto Transit Commission and the London Court House (London, Ontario).

Claude Breeze has taught at Simon Fraser University (1967), the Banff Centre School of Fine Arts (now the BANFF CENTRE FOR CONTINUING EDUCATION, 1972), the University of Calgary (1975), and the Emily Carr School of Art (1988). In 1972, he became artist-in-residence at the University of Western Ontario. He has taught at York University in Toronto since 1976.