BRITISH COLUMBIA ARTISTS  

Norma Elizabeth Park
(m James Street Decam Brandon, Jr.)

May 1 1908 - 2001

Vancouver School of Decorative and Applied Arts (Diploma 1931)


Norma Park was born in Eastern Canada. The family may have lived in Battleford SK prior to moving to Vancouver. Her father John A. Park was a jeweller, who worked for Birk's when they moved to Vancouver. The City Directories first list the Parks living in Vancouver at 4341 Sophia in 1921. In 1922 they were living at 47 West 23rd, and from 1923 on living at 4355 Sophia Street.

Park was an early graduate from the Vancouver School of Decorative and Applied Arts, receiving her diploma in the school's third graduating class in 1931.


1931 Graduating Class

The 1931 City Directory lists Park as living at 4355 Sophia Street in Vancouver. That address was listed as the residence of John A. Park (Ethel K.), employed as a watchmaker at Birk's. In 1935 she was listed as Park, Norma E. artist 4355 Sophia. She was not listed after 1935, and by 1940 the family was not at that address.

She exhibited work at the Vancouver Art Gallery in the 1932 All Canadian Exhibition and the 1933 2nd Annual B.C. Artists exhibition.

In 1933 she had a studio at 1087 Bute Street, along with a number of other artists and art teachers, including Fred Varley, Jock Macdonald, Maud Sherman, Maisie Robertson, and Vera Weatherbie.


Norma Park, Maisie Robertson, Maud Sherman at Parakontas.


Fred Varley painted a large two-sided portrait of Norma. It was sold at auction by the Heffel Gallery in 2008 for $650,000.00 CDN. Varley exhibited a painting of this title at the Canadian National Exhibition in Toronto in 1930, it may be the same painting.

Park married James Brandon (an R.C.M.P. officer, born in Victoria), they had two daughters, born in Edmonton 1941 and Lamont AB in 1943. After her marriage Norma Park did not carry on her art career, although she did teach drawing lessons to children. The family also lived in Redwater and Hardisty, AB. After his retirement, the family moved to Qualicum Beach, where Norma made sculptures out of driftwood on the beach. Brandon died in Edmonton in 1991. Park died in Edmonton in 2001.


GROUP EXHIBITIONS
DATE EXHIBITION ARTWORK
1932 May - July VAG   All Canadian Exhibition Youth
1932 Sept. 17 - 30 PASOVAS   Club Exhibition "The Dance of Sound"
1933 Feb. 13 - 18 Sylvia Court    West End Artists Exhibition (titles not known)
1933 May 3 - 18 VAG   VSAGA 1st Annual Exhibition Mask
Inner Darkness
1933 Sept. 22 - Oct. 15 VAG   B.C. Artists 2nd Annual Mask
Marge

References

CITY & PROVINCIAL DIRECTORIES 1920-40 (refer to DIR)

Email correspondence with daughter, New Zealand, January 2024

Clippings

"The other large picture is "The Dance of Sound," a far better piece of work than Norma Park showed recently in another Exhibition. Here the conception is understandable and the colour tones very beautiful."
      From "The Note Book" by Julia W. Henshaw
      Vancouver Sun, October 1 1932

" ... and Norma Park have excellent examples of their work on view."
      From "'West End' Show Of Art Works" by D.S.M.
      Vancouver Sun, February 15 1933


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