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Charles Shaw Band (1885-1969) was a Toronto business executive, philanthropist and collector of Canadian art. He was born in Thorold, Ontario and educated at Upper Canada College in Toronto. In 1914 he married Helen Huntington Warren (whose mother Sarah Trumbull Van Lennep Warren was a founder of the Art Gallery of Toronto) with whom he began collecting artworks. During his career, he worked with many Canadian firms, including Canadian Surety, Goderich Elevator and Transit Co. Ltd., Manufacturers Life Insurance, Toronto General Trust, as well as Gutta Percha and Rubber Limited of Toronto.

In addition to his business interests, Band was affiliated with various community organisations including the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, the Canadian National Institute for the Blind, the John Howard Society, the Red Cross, the Art Gallery of Toronto, and the National Film Board.

Band was a friend of members of the Group of Seven, especially Lawren Harris and Fred Varley. He was President of the Art Gallery of Toronto 1945-1948 and again in 1964-1965. In 1948 he was made Officier d’Académie by the French government for his role in bringing an exhibition of French masters to Canada the previous year. The noted Collection of Mr and Mrs Charles S. Band was the subject of exhibitions in Toronto, Montreal, Ottawa, Vancouver, Los Angeles and other cities. C. S. Band died in Toronto in 1969, leaving the bulk of his collection to the Art Gallery of Ontario.

Iain Baxter& is a Canadian conceptual artist with a wide-ranging career. He was born Iain Joseph Wilson Baxter in 1936 in Middlesbrough, England, and moved to Calgary, Alberta with his family one year later. While studying biology at the University of Idaho, Baxter met Elaine Hieber, whom he married in 1959. Following studies in the U.S. and Japan, the Baxters moved to Vancouver in 1964, when Iain accepted a teaching position at the University of British Columbia. In subsequent years, he also taught at Simon Fraser University and the Emily Carr College of Art. Early collaborative art ventures culminated in the development of the N.E. Thing Company in 1967. The company functioned as an “aesthetic umbrella,”
allowing Iain and his wife to work collaboratively and anonymously to produce a wide range of art forms and projects. The N.E. Thing Co. was formally incorporated in 1969, with Iain Baxter as President and Elaine as Vice President; the two later became co-presidents. Elaine Baxter adopted Ingrid as her preferred name in 1971. Among the company’s projects was the Eye Scream Restaurant, in operation from 1977 to 1978. Following the Baxters’ divorce, the company dissolved in 1978. Iain Baxter returned to Calgary in 1981, where he taught at the Alberta College of Art. For a brief period (1983-84), he was employed as Creative Consultant to the Labatt Brewing Company. Since 1988, Baxter has lived in
Windsor, Ontario, where he teaches at the University of Windsor. He married Louise Martin in 1984. In 2005, he legally changed his surname to Baxterand, commonly using the forms “Baxter&” or “BAXTER&”. Baxter&’s work is particularly informed by the ideas of Marshall McLuhan and communications theory. He also cites the art of Giorgio Morandi, Zen Buddhism, and his early studies in biology and ecology as conceptual influences. Baxter& has explored a broad range of media and genres, including vacuum-formed plastic, inflated vinyl, telex, polaroid prints, environmental art and multimedia installation. His work is included in the collections of numerous major Canadian and international galleries.

Ingrid Baxter (1938-) is a Canadian conceptual artist known for her work as part of the N.E. Thing Company.

Paul Bennett (1928-2014), curator and arts administrator, was the first Field Director / Adviser of the Art Institute of Ontario (1959-1964). He then became Director, serving until 1968.

Michael Bidner (1944-1989) was an Ontario artist who worked in print and mixed media, perhaps best known for his works in xerography and mail art. Born in London, Ontario, Bidner graduated from the technical high school H.B. Beal Secondary and briefly attended the Ontario College of Art before dropping out to pursue his art independently. During his career, Bidner worked with various media, including silkscreening, collage, slides, photography, and video. Bidner used the name “Cloud” in some of his projects and often incorporated the shape of an upside down “Y” as a signature symbol. In the 1970s, Bidner produced or co-created a number of alternative art-based publications: Adz magazine (founder), Rag magazine (co-founder), and Rude magazine (co-founder/art director). In the mid-1970s, Xerox Canada Ltd. provided the McIntosh Gallery at the University of Western Ontario with one of their new colour copier machines to help promote its use. In the spring of 1976, Michael Bidner and artist Michael Hayden exhibited their copy art and led a number of public workshops. Later that year, Bidner and Hayden were part of the “Colour Xerography” group show at the Art Gallery of Ontario, which also included the work of
Jaan Poldaas, Flavio Belli, Barbara Astman, and Robert Arn.

Bidner was also interested in philately and mail art, coining the term “artistamp” to refer to his postage art. In 1984, he organized the first international exhibition of mail art, titled “Artistampex,” in London, Ontario. Networking and letter-writing with mail artists in Canada and abroad, Bidner began compiling a groundbreaking database of artists and artwork entitled “Standard Artistamp Catalogue and Handbook.” Unfortunately, his declining health prevented him from finishing the project. Following unsuccessful attempts to place his collection at a Canadian art institution, Bidner’s personal collection of original postage art was given to the Artpool Art Research Center in Budapest, Hungary in 1989. Michael Bidner
passed away of AIDS in 1989.

David Blackwood (1941-2022) was a Canadian artist known for his prints depicting Newfoundland life and culture. Born in Wesleyville, Newfoundland in 1941, Blackwood was exposed to subjects which influenced the themes represented in his art: fishermen and sealers and their families; relationships with the land; harsh landscapes; and the importance of tradition to communities on Canada’s east coast. Blackwood attended the Ontario College of Art from 1959-1963, where he studied printmaking. Subsequently, he was the first artist-in-residence at Erindale College at University of Toronto Mississauga, from 1969 to 1975. The Erindale College Art Gallery was renamed The Blackwood Gallery in 1992 in the artist’s honour. In 1976, Blackwood was the subject of a documentary produced by the National Film Board of Canada – titled Blackwood – which was nominated for an Academy Award. Blackwood was a member of the AGO Board of Trustees and the Inuit Art Foundation in Ottawa. He was also the recipient of numerous other awards and accolades, including honorary doctorates at the University of Calgary and Memorial University of Newfoundland (1992); a National Heritage Award (1993); the Order of Ontario (2002); and the Order of Canada (1993).

Blackwood exhibited nationally and internationally, with over 90 solo shows throughout the span of his career. In 1999 he donated 242 archival prints to the AGO, making the gallery an international research centre for the artist’s work. He was named an honorary chair of the AGO in 2003. The AGO presented a major retrospective of Blackwood’s work in 2011, titled Black Ice: David Blackwood Prints of Newfoundland. Blackwood’s works are also in the collection of the National Gallery of Canada, Montreal Museum of Fine Art, Memorial University of Newfoundland, Winnipeg Art Gallery, National Gallery of Florence, and Uffizi Gallery in Florence, amongst others. Blackwood has resided in Port Hope, Ontario since the 1970s, where he was a teacher of drawing and painting at Trinity College School.

Ruth Jean Blodgett (American-Canadian, 1945-2020) was a curator known for her work on Inuit art and associated with a number of Canadian museums including the McMichael Canadian Art Collection, the Winnipeg Art Gallery and the Art Gallery of Ontario. Blodgett was born in Moscow, Idaho and grew up in Prosser, Washington. She completed her undergraduate studies at the University of Colorado before pursuing a Master’s degree at the University of British Columbia (1974). Blodgett’s MA thesis on multiple human images in Inuit sculpture proved foundational to her career. As a curator at the Winnipeg Art Gallery (ca. 1976-1979) she produced exhibitions on Jessie Oonark, Inuit shamanism and the artists of Povungnituk, among other topics. Through the 1980s, Blodgett worked as a freelance curator, producing significant exhibitions for the Art Gallery of Ontario (Grasp tight the old ways : selections from the Klamer family collection of Inuit art, 1983, and North Baffin drawings: drawings collected by Terry Ryan on North Baffin Island in 1964, 1986), the London Regional Art Gallery (Etidlooie Etidlooie, 1984), and the Agnes Etherington Art Centre (Selections from the John and Mary Robertson collection of Inuit sculpture, 1986). By 1984 she had moved to Ottawa where she taught courses at Carleton University. Blodgett was Chief Curator of the McMichael Canadian Art Collection from 1988 to 2000, where she co-led the borrowing of the Kinngait archive of drawings and produced exhibitions and publications on Inuit graphic arts. Her major book on Kenojuak Ashevak was published in 1981 and went through 6 editions. Blodgett moved to Fairbanks, Alaska in 2004, where she was a visiting professor in Arctic Art at the University of Alaska and participated as an expert team member in travel expeditions for Adventure Canada. During this time she continued to do freelance research projects such as In the Shadow of the Midnight Sun for the Art Gallery of Hamilton (2007). Jean Blodgett died in Fairbanks in 2020.

D’Arcy Boulton, Jr. (1785–1846) and his wife, Sarah Anne (née Robinson), (1789–1863) built the Grange House in 1817 and lived there with their eight children John Andrew (1810?-1830), William Henry (1812-1874), D’Arcy Edward (1814-1885), Beverley Robert (?-1840), Mary Sayer (1816-1837), Emma Robinson (1818-1890), Sarah Ann (1824?-1906), and John (1829-1882).

Both sides of the family were members of the powerful elite in Upper Canada - Sarah Anne’s brother was Chief Justice John Beverley Robinson, the leader of the Family Compact, and Boultons and their friends enjoyed influence, favourable business dealings, and Crown appointments.

D’Arcy had trained as a lawyer but worked as a merchant with his brother-in-law, Peter Robinson. Once settled in The Grange he retired and became a landowner. He also held minor government positions.

Their eldest surviving son, William (1812–1874), continued to live in the house. He also trained and practised as a lawyer. William was also an alderman, was appointed mayor of Toronto four times and was a member of parliament.

In 1846, William married Harriet Dixon (1825–1909), a Bostonian from a wealthy family. They had no children. After William’s death, Harriet married scholar and political writer Goldwin Smith (1823–1910). Harriet left the Grange House to the Art Museum of Toronto (now the Art Gallery of Ontario) in her will.

Christine Boyanoski (1955-) is a Canadian art historian and curator who was on the staff of the Art Gallery of Ontario in the 1980s and 1990s.

John Bernard Boyle (1941- ) is an artist, activist, curator and writer who has lived and worked in St. Catharines, London, Elsinore, and Peterborough, Ontario. He married Janet Perlman, with whom he has one daughter, Emily. Boyle was educated at London Teachers’ College and the University of Western Ontario, and is self-taught as a painter. He taught elementary school in St. Catharines intermittently between 1962 and 1968. In 1974 he moved with his family to a converted church in Elsinore, Ontario (near Owen Sound), where he had his studio until 2002. He is currently based in Peterborough. Boyle began to exhibit his paintings in 1964, the same year he was inspired by meeting London artists including Jack Chambers and Greg Curnoe. In 1966 controversy arose at the London Public Library and Art Museum over Boyle’s exhibited piece Seated Nude. Boyle was an early participant in London’s 20/20 Gallery. In 1972 he designed sets for the play Buffalo Jump at Theatre Passe Muraille, Toronto; that same year he curated the first Billboard Show in St. Catharines. In 1980 Boyle completed the mural Our Knell for Queen Subway Station, Toronto. From 1973 through the 1990s, Boyle exhibited regularly at Nancy Poole’s Studio, Toronto. A key figure among the artist activists who established professional representation and rights for artists in the early 1970s, Boyle was the founding spokesperson of Canadian Artists Representation Ontario (CARO) in 1971. In 1970 he served as the first president of the Niagara Artists Co-operative (later Company). Boyle was a member of the Board of Trustees of the Art Gallery of Ontario, 1975-1977. Boyle has written extensively in journals including 20 Cents Magazine, Parachute, and Twelve Mile Creek. His regular column “According to Boyle” in CAROT (1975-78) dealt with challenges facing artists. Boyle has written three novels, No Angel Came (1995); and the unpublished The Gergovnians and The Peregrinations and Permutations of a Young Artist in Canada. His illustration and book design work includes The Port Dalhousie Stories by Dennis Tourbin (1987), as well as several magazine articles and book jackets. He initiated the discipline of “Canadology” in 1989 to record the social customs of the country. Boyle is a founding member (since 1965) and principal kazooist of The Nihilist Spasm Band. His work is represented in numerous Canadian collections, including the National Gallery, the Art Gallery of Ontario and the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.