Collections

The Hart House Collection

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The Hart House Permanent Collection is a major collection of Canadian art developed by the Hart House Art Committee and administered by the Art Museum. Inaugurated in 1922 the Art Committee built the core of the original collection with representative artworks by members of the Group of Seven and their contemporaries. More recently, the Art Committee expanded its collecting strategy to include a greater diversity of media as well as works by artists of increasingly diverse cultural backgrounds. With its exclusive focus on supporting living Canadian artists through the purchase of their work, today the collection numbers over 700 works of art, including 59 artworks deemed “National Treasures.” Works from the Hart House Permanent Collection are on view throughout Hart House and are in constant demand for exhibitions at major museums around the world. Image: Oliver Husain, French Exit, 2018. Video installation with sound, and vertical blinds, 16 minutes. Purchase by the Hart House Art Committee, 2019. HH2019.007

The Malcove Collection

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Over the course of 50 years, Dr. Lillian Malcove (1902-1981) developed a collection of over 500 objects, comprised of paintings, drawings, furniture, icons, manuscripts, and textiles, as well as sculptural objects in a diversity of materials that reflect her varied interests and prodigious knowledge. Spanning a vast range of art history, from prehistory to the 20th century, the strengths of the Collection are Early Christian, Byzantine and Post Byzantine objects. Dr. Malcove bequeathed her magnificent collection along with a major endowment, which supports the permanent display of the Collection, to the University of Toronto in 1981 to serve as a useful and inspiring resource for students, faculty and the general public. In 2002, a generous donation by Dr. John Foreman of London, Ontario, added 55 Greek and Russian icons dating from the 16th to 20th centuries to the Malcove Collection. This gift makes the Malcove Collection one of the most important and invaluable resources for students and experts conducting research on Byzantine icons and iconography in Canada.. Image: Aleksandra Exter, Untitled design for acrobatic costumes, 1927(?), (detail). Gouache, graphite. Gift of Dr. Lillian Malcove. M82.026.

The University College Collection

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Currently comprising nearly 600 works, the University College (UC) Collection is the oldest on campus, as UC was the founding college of the University of Toronto. Many works have been donated over the years by members of the College's large and active alumni association. The collection focuses on Canadian art, including important pieces by the Group of Seven and some of their influential forerunners - landscape artists of the 19th century. Highlights of the collection include a small 1917 oil sketch by Tom Thomson and several works by the late Barker Fairley, a renowned professor of German literature at University College. The collection also has a number of portraits, especially of individuals who have been important in the life of the College over the years, and works of northern landscapes by such Group of Seven members as Lawren S. Harris, A.Y. Jackson, Arthur Lismer, J.E.H. MacDonald, and A.J. Casson. Image: Robert Giard, Five Members of “Other Countries”, 1987. Gelatin silver print, printed December 1987. Gift of Jonathan Silin, 2012. UC815.

The University of Toronto Art Collection

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The University of Toronto Collection comprises over 5,000 works of art, of which approximately 1,100 pieces are installed across the St. George campus at any given time through the Art on Campus program. Some works have traditionally resided in their faculties or departments, such as portraits of former deans, while others have been installed to enhance the working and teaching environment of the campus. The collection is eclectic and wide-ranging, from works of art from East Asia, installed in the Cheng Yu Tung East Asian Library, to examples of contemporary Inuit art placed throughout the Rotman School of Management. The collection continues to be built by donations of art, with particular, though not exclusive emphasis on Canadian and international art of the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Image: Louis Arviyut, Scrimshaw hand, ink and antler, c. 1975, 21.7 x 18 x 3.5 cm., (detail). Gift of Vincent Massey Tovell, 2014.