The Jack Pine - Legacy

Legacy

The Jack Pine, with other works by Thomson, has become an iconic representation of the Canadian landscape. Thomson's life and mysterious death is a popular subject of Canadian biography and poetry. Even The Jack Pine is a title referent in a few poems, including Henry Beissel's "Tom Thomson's Jackpine" and Doug Barbour's "Tom Thomson's 'The Jack Pine' (1916–1917)". Beissel's poem concludes:

... the light is at peace with the tree and the lake.
Calmly it amplifies the beryline silence brooding
on the waters where Tom's spirit rests forever
alongside the sky stretched out in the shadow
of the jackpine that holds heaven and earth
together in an embrace encompassing the hills
the lake, the seasons, and the void that fills
the dark spaces between them and infinity.

The painting has been widely reproduced, seen across Canada in schools and public institutions. In 1967, a stamp featuring The Jack Pine was released to coincide with the fiftieth anniversary of the painting's creation and Thomson's death.

The pine depicted in the painting was located by park staff in 1970. The tree was already dead by the time of its discovery; it later fell over and was used for firewood by campers. A lookout at Grand Lake now marks the site of the painting with a plaque that notes the significance of Thomson's work and depicts the painting alongside a photograph of the scene from the 1970s, before the tree fell.