Sarah Milroy
Born
Sarah Nichol
Known forcurator, museum director, writer
SpouseTom Milroy
AwardsOrder of Canada (2022)

Sarah Milroy CM is the executive director and chief curator of the McMichael Canadian Collection in Kleinburg, Ontario, responsible for the 2021 exhibition and editor of the book Uninvited: Canadian women artists in the modern moment (2021), as well as Tom Thomson: North Star (2023) and contributing to numerous books on art, including Mary Pratt, From the Forest to the Sea: Emily Carr in British Columbia, and David Milne: Modern Painting. She is a champion of the art of Canada.[1][2]

Early years

Milroy was the third daughter born to Elizabeth Nichol, who founded Vancouver's Equinox Gallery in 1972[3] and John Nichol, a Liberal politician and senator who served in the Second World War and was made a Companion of the Order of Canada.[1][4] She grew up in Vancouver and studied English literature at McGill University (BA 1979),[5] Cambridge University (NC 1980),[6] and at Hunter College in New York where she received a master's in art history.[1] She planned to be a teacher, but an exhibition of Paraskeva Clark in 1982 changed her focus. Having written about the show for the journal Canadian Forum, she decided to write about art.[1]

Career

From 1984 to 1996, she wrote for the journal Canadian Art, and in 1991 became its editor and publisher.[7] She also contributed to the CBC as a visual arts correspondent. In 1996, she began working for the Globe and Mail covering the visual arts in Vancouver. She became the newspaper's chief art critic in 2001 and remained there until 2011, afterwards working as an independent art critic and curator.[2]

She co-curated three international exhibitions for the Dulwich Picture Gallery in London in collaboration with its then Sackler director, Ian Dejardin (afterwards executive director of the McMichael Canadian Art Collection until 2023): From the Forest to the Sea: Emily Carr in British Columbia (shown at the Art Gallery of Ontario, 2015); Vanessa Bell (2016) and David Milne: Modern Painting (2018) shown in Canada at the Vancouver Art Gallery and the McMichael Canadian Art Collection.[2] Milroy also wrote essays for catalogues, often for shows she curated or co-curated, on artists such as Jack Chambers (2011) and Greg Curnoe (2001), both for the Art Gallery of Ontario,[7] as well as Mary Pratt (2013), Lionel LeMoine FitzGerald (2019),[8] Gathie Falk (2022) and others.[9]

In 2018, Milroy was made chief curator at McMichael[2] and she and the museum worked to broaden the collection guidelines and rebalance the narrative, bringing in black, Indigenous and people of colour artists, as well as focusing on women artists.[1] She balanced A Like Vision: the Group of Seven & Tom Thomson, which she co-authored with Dejardin, works selected from the gallery's collection by members of the Group of Seven, to mark the 100th anniversary of its founding and an exhibition of Tom Thomson,[10] with Uninvited: Canadian Women Artists in the Modern Moment, a show with a major book catalogue, of 40 modernist Canadian women painters. The show upheld the accomplishments of women artists and was widely reviewed as offering a wider and more inclusive picture of the visual arts in Canada during a pivotal modern period.[1][10][11][12][13]

Milroy has served as a member of the Canada Committee of Human Rights Watch, a board member of the Art Canada Institute,[9] and a member of the Editorial Advisory board of the Inuit Art Quarterly.[14]

Awards and honours

  • 2018: Milroy's cover story on Jessie Oonark OC, RCA (1906–1985) for the Inuit Art Quarterly's 30th Anniversary issue, was shortlisted for Best Editorial Package at the National Magazine Awards;[14]
  • 2020: Milroy was made a Member of the Order of Canada for her role in promoting Canadian art and artists;[15]
  • 2022: Uninvited received the Canadian Museum Association Award for "Outstanding Achievement - Research".[16]

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Zentil, Estelle. "Article". mycitylife.ca. City Life Magazine. Retrieved 29 December 2023.
  2. 1 2 3 4 "Article". mcmichael.com. McMichael Canadian Art Collection, Kleinburg. Retrieved 29 December 2023.
  3. ↑ "Article". momus.ca. Momus. Retrieved 30 December 2023.
  4. ↑ "Obituaries". pearsoncollege.ca. Pearson College. Retrieved 30 December 2023.
  5. ↑ "Article". mcgillnews.mcgill.ca. McGill News. Retrieved 29 December 2023.
  6. ↑ "Article". newn.cam.ac.uk. Cambridge University. Retrieved 29 December 2023.
  7. 1 2 "Article". scotiabank.com. McMichael Canadian Art Collection, Kleinburg. Retrieved 29 December 2023.
  8. ↑ "Into the light : Lionel LeMoine FitzGerald". library.gallery.ca. Figure 1 Publishing and McMichael. Retrieved 8 January 2024.
  9. 1 2 "Speakers". arttoronto.ca. ArtToronto. Retrieved 31 December 2023.
  10. 1 2 "Article". dwhauthor.wordpress.com. Douglas Hunter. Retrieved 30 December 2023.
  11. ↑ "Article". americanwomenartists.org. American Women Artists. Retrieved 30 December 2023.
  12. ↑ "Article". ngc.ca. National Gallery of Canada. Retrieved 30 December 2023.
  13. ↑ Tippett, Maris. "Article". thebcreview.ca. the BC Review.
  14. 1 2 "Article". inuitartfoundation.org. Inuit Art Foundation. Retrieved 31 December 2023.
  15. ↑ "Article". mcmichael.com. McMichael. Retrieved 30 December 2023.
  16. ↑ "Awards". museums.ca. CMA. Retrieved 31 December 2023.
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