Franklin Carmichael

Franklin Carmichael RCA (May 4, 1890 – October 24, 1945) was a Canadian artist and member of the Group of Seven. Though he was primarily famous for his use of watercolours, he also used oil paints, charcoal and other media to capture the Ontario landscapes. Besides his work as a painter, he worked as a designer and illustrator, creating promotional brochures, advertisements in newspapers and magazines, and designing books. Near the end of his life, Carmichael taught in the Graphic Design and Commercial Art Department at the Ontario College of Art (today the Ontario College of Art & Design University).

The youngest original member of the Group of Seven, Carmichael often found himself socially on the outside of the group. Despite this, the art he produced was of equal measure in terms of style and approach to the other members' contributions, vividly expressing his spiritual views through his art. The next youngest member was A. J. Casson with whom he was friendly.

Franklin Carmichael was born in 1890 in Orillia, Ontario, the son of David Graham and Susannah Eleanor (Smith) Carmichael. Because his artistic talents were already apparent at a very young age, his mother enrolled him in both music and art lessons.

As a teenager, Carmichael worked in his father's carriage making shop as a striper. In decorating the carriages he practiced his design, drawing, and colouring skills.

In 1910, at the age of twenty, Carmichael arrived in Toronto and entered the Ontario College of Art, where he studied with William Cruickshank and George Reid. Among his fellow students was Gustav Hahn.

By 1911, he began working as an apprentice at Grip Ltd. making $2.50 a week. Late in the year, Lawren Harris and J. E. H. MacDonald began sketching together, soon to be joined by Carmichael and his coworkers at Grip, including Arthur Lismer, Tom Thomson and Frank Johnston. By 1913, the excursions also included Frederick Varley and A.Y. Jackson.

Carmichael moved to Antwerp, Belgium in 1913 to study painting at Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts. Due to the outbreak of World War I, he cut his studies short and returned to his native Ontario in September 1914, rejoining Thomson, Macdonald, Lismer, Varley and Johnston. Staying in Toronto during the war, they struggled in the depressed wartime economy.

During the fall of 1914, he moved into the Studio Building and shared a space with Thomson over the winter.