An open letter to the fans and admirers of Ken Danby
On the autumn afternoon of September 23rd, Ken Danby, accompanied by his wife Gillian and friends, paddled a canoe across North Tea Lake in Algonquin Park gathering reference material for future paintings. The weather was glorious and the trees glowed with brilliant colour. Laughter echoed across the lake. As the group was about to retire for the day, Ken suddenly collapsed and died immediately, despite valiant efforts to revive him.
The world lost a great talent that afternoon; an artist in every sense of the word. His family and staff are stunned and greatly saddened by his passing, but we take some measure of comfort in knowing that his last hours were happy and in beautiful surroundings rich in the history of Canadian painting and that he did not suffer. We will miss his eloquence, his humor, his leadership, his affection, his artistic vision. We will miss the paintings he did not get to paint, but will continue to admire and enjoy the legacy of paintings he left behind.
To those that wrote emails, cards, contributed to the Ken Danby Legacy Fund or to our blog, we thank you for your donations, kind words and compassion. He would be touched by the generous outpourings from his thousands of admirers. We may have physically lost a great artist and wonderful human being but his spirit will live on and we'll never forget him.
