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FRY (SYMONS), Beatrice Adelaide (Bessie)
- Born
- Farringdon, Berkshire, England, 1884
- Died
- Victoria, B.C., 1976
- Biography synopsis
- Bessie Fry initially lived in Halifax (1914) on moving to Canada and subsequently became an army nurse in Montreal in 1918; it was only when she moved to Vancouver in 1919 that she returned to art studies at the Vancouver School of Art (1926-1927), under F.H. Varley and Jock MacDonald. She had apparently taken art courses at the Spenlove School of Painting before she left England and was a pupil at the Art Student's League in New York. Working primarily in landscape rendered in woodblock print, in 1920, she exhibited at the Annual Exhibition of the B.C. Society of Fine Arts and participated regularly in the Society's annual exhibition over the next five decades. Fry also exhibited her work through the late 1920s and 1930s in Alberta, the Seattle Art Museum, the Royal Canadian Academy (1927-1933), and the Island Arts and Crafts Society. Fry had three solo shows at the Vancouver Art Gallery (1933, 1940 and 1948) and the Art Gallery of Victoria (1963). In 1946, she won the George Reid medal in Toronto. Her works are held at the Art Gallery of Alberta, Art Gallery of Guelph, Art Gallery of Hamilton, and Art Gallery of Greater Victoria.
- Media used
- Painting
- Printmaking
- Watercolour
- Education
- Vancouver School of Decorative and Applied Arts (VSDAA), 1926 - 1927 (under F. Varley, Jock MacDonald)
- Memberships
- Edmonton Art Club, 1922
- British Columbia Society of Artists
- Federation of Canadian Artists
- West Vancouver Sketch Club
- File & Archive locations
- Montreal Museum of Fine Arts / Musée des Beaux-Arts de Montréal, QC
- National Gallery of Canada, ON - Library and Archives
- University of British Columbia - Fine Arts Library
- Vancouver Art Gallery, BC - Library
- City of Edmonton Archives, AB
- Canadian Women Artists History Initiative Documentation Centre, QC
- BIBLIOGRAPHY
Writings about- Ainslie, Patricia. Images of the Land: Canadian Block Prints 1919-1945 Calgary: Glenbow Museum, 1984
- Diogenes (Bernard McEvoy). "B.C. Society of Fine Arts." Vancouver Daily Province 26 April 1928
- McCarthy, Pearl. "O.S.A. presents 74th Exhibition." The Globe and Mail 9 Mar. 1946: 8
- McEvoy, Bernard (Diogenes). "B.A. Fry and Margaret Lougheed also have Striking Examples in the same Line." Vancouver Daily Province 28 April 1928
- McEvoy, Bernard (Diogenes). "Miss B.A. Fry's Small but Choice Pastels filled their Niche well." Vancouver Daily Province 13 Nov. 1930
- Moir, Nikki. "No Sunday Painters here." Vancouver Sun 15 May 1960
- Myers, Reta W. "In the Domain of Art." Daily Province 24 Apr. 1933
- Palette. "In The Realm of Art: Summer Show at Gallery Major Event for Art Lovers." Vancouver Daily Province 7 July 1943
- Prakash, A. K. Independent Spirit: Early Canadian Women's Art Buffalo, New York: Firefly Books, 2008
- Toynbee, Barbara Jean and Jessie Anne Toynebee. Bessie Adelaide Fry Symons: Her Life in Paintings, Prints, and Pastels Victoria, B.C.: Indigo Sky Graphic Design, 2002
- Tuele, Nicholas, and Christina Johnson-Dean. British Columbia Women Artists, 1885-1985 Victoria: Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, 1985
