Robert Houle is one of the most accomplished and respected artists working in Canada today. With long experience as a teacher, curator, and a trenchant commentator on Indigenous rights, his paintings and installations provide an expansive and inclusive sense of what art can be. His 50-year retrospective Robert Houle: Red is Beautiful originated at the Art Gallery of Ontario in 2021, was seen across Canada, and is currently on view at the National Museum of the American Indian in Washington, D.C.

In Afternoon with Rebecca, Houle paints with liquid versatility, creating an atmospheric surface across which colours and forms meld. At the same time, he commands our specific visual attention with assertive gestures and runs of paint in black and white. These marks are declarative, like pointed comments made in a conversation or like laughter.

Houle calls this painting an “abstract portrait” of famed artist Rebecca Belmore (Lac Seul First Nation [Anishinaabe]). We can fleetingly identify a seated figure whose grey-shrouded lower body extends towards us as her upper torso tilts away to the left. Houle has evoked the dynamic Belmore in ways that a more conventional and realistic portrait could never do.

Mark A. Cheetham