Saskatchewan Artist

Claude Breeze

Claude Breeze was born in 1938 in Nelson, British Columbia, but spent his childhood in Saskatoon. In his late teens he studied there with Ernest Lindner (1954-1955) and then in Regina with Arthur McKay, Roy Kiyooka, Ron Bloore, and Kenneth Lochhead. Breeze then attended the Vancouver School of Art in 1958, and remained in Vancouver to work in the medical illustration department at the University of British Columbia.

It was in the 1960s that Breeze's paintings first garnered national attention after his first exhibition, “Lovers in a Landscape,” at New Design Gallery in Vancouver. Breeze's political and often violent paintings invoked television, the Vietnam War, and the American civil-rights movement, among other themes. His work has been exhibited widely in Canada, the United States, England, France, and Scotland. In 1967, Breeze's paintings were part of a two-person exhibition at the MacKenzie Art Gallery in Regina with Regina artist Brian Fisher.

Breeze has taught at Simon Fraser University (1967), Banff Centre School of Fine Arts (1972), the University of Calgary (1975), and the Emily Carr School of Art (1988). In 1972, Breeze became artist-in-residence at the University of Western Ontario, and in 1976, he joined the Fine Arts faculty at York University (Toronto).

Breeze was elected to the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts in 1974 and received the Queen's Jubilee Medal in 1978. He has received many commissions, including from the Bank of Nova Scotia, the Pacific Centre Mall (Vancouver), the Toronto Transit Commission (1977) and the London Court House (London, Ontario, 1974).

Claude Breeze lives in Toronto, Ontario.