Paul Kane - Life in Toronto

Life in Toronto

Kane permanently settled in Toronto. He went West once more when he was hired by a British party in 1849 as a guide and interpreter, but they went only as far as the Red River Colony. An exhibition of 240 of his sketches in November 1848 in Toronto met with great success, and a second exhibition in September 1852 of eight oil canvases was also received favourably. The politician George William Allan took note of the artist and became his most important patron, commissioning one hundred oil paintings for the price of $20,000 in 1852. This enabled Kane to live a life as a professional artist. Kane also succeeded in 1851 to convince the Canadian Parliament to commission twelve paintings for the sum of £500, which he delivered in late 1856.

In 1853, Kane married Harriet Clench (1823–92), the daughter of his former employer at Cobourg. David Wilson, a contemporary historian of the University of Toronto, reported that she was also a skilled painter and writer. They had four children, two sons and two daughters.

Until 1857, Kane fulfilled his commissions: more than 120 oil canvases for Allan, the Parliament, and Simpson. His works were shown at the World's Fair at Paris in 1855, where they were reviewed very positively, and some of them were sent to Buckingham Palace in 1858 for consideration by the Queen. By that time Kane had also prepared a manuscript derived from his travel notes and sent to a publishing house in London for publication. When he did not hear back from them, he travelled to London and, with the support of Simpson, got the book published the next year. It was titled The Wanderings of an Artist among the Indians of North America from Canada to Vancouver's Island and Oregon through the Hudson's Bay Company's Territory and Back Again and was originally published by Longman, Brown, Green, Longmans & Roberts in London in 1859, illustrated with many lithographs of his own sketches and paintings. Kane had dedicated the book to Allan, which upset Simpson so that he broke off his relations with Kane. The book was an immediate success and had appeared by 1863 in French, Danish, and German editions.

Kane's eyesight was failing rapidly in the 1860s and forced him to abandon painting altogether. Frederick Arthur Verner, who had been inspired by Kane and was an artist of "western" scenes, became an acquaintance and friend. Verner did three portraits of the ageing Paul Kane, one of which is today at the Royal Ontario Museum. Kane died unexpectedly one winter morning in his home, just having gotten back from his daily walk. He is buried at the St. James Cemetery in Toronto.