"One curator said he didn't want my work in his gallery because it was so simple even children understood it. I thought, what a wonderful tribute!"
(Ted Harrison quoted in "Harrison" by Flora Evans. Up Here: Life in Canada's North, June-July, 1986. Yellowknife, NWT: Outcrop Publishing, 1986. P. 39.)
Educated in England, Ted Harrison graduated first with a National Diploma in Design and later with an Art Teacher's Diploma. He then set out to see the world, working with British Army Intelligence and as a teacher before falling in love with the Yukon and settling in Carcross in the fall of 1968. Harrison became a Canadian citizen in 1973 and taught art until 1979, when he became a full-time artist and illustrator. He credits the vast and majestic beauty of the Yukon with the bold lines and unusual choice of colours that are so predominant in his art. In a Harrison painting a lake may be orange, a moose blue, and a sky a rainbow of reds. His books begin as pictures in his mind, and the story is created around the image. He doesn't do preliminary sketches but prefers to draw the background first, then add colour, and eventually people, animals, and houses. Uncluttered and vibrantly coloured, Harrison's style is distinctive. Tiny creatures -- dogs, ravens, and people in colourful parkas -- are set against an overwhelming expanse of land, mountains, sea, and sky. He has illustrated and written books for children, among them two Robert Service poems, "The Cremation of Sam McGee" and "The Shooting of Dan McGrew", and A Northern Alphabet for which he received the International Board on Books for Young People (IBBY) Honour Award. He has been a Member of the Order of Canada since 1987.
Awards
 1984 | International Board on Books for Young People (IBBY) Certificate of Honour, for illustration, for A Northern Alphabet. |
Selected Bibliography
Books for Children
The Blue Raven. Written and illustrated by Ted Harrison. Toronto: Macmillan of Canada, 1989.
32 p.: col. ill.; 27 cm.
ISBN 0771592884
Children of the Yukon. Written and illustrated by Ted Harrison. Montreal: Tundra Books of Montreal; Plattsburgh: Tundra Books of Northern New York, 1977.
24 p.: chiefly col. ill.; 25 x 27 cm.
ISBN 0887760929
ISBN 0887761631
The Cremation of Sam McGee. Written by Robert W. Service; illustrated by Ted Harrison; introduction by Pierre Berton. Toronto: Kids Can Press, 1986, c1907.
32 p.: col. ill., maps; 31 cm.
ISBN 0919964923
The Last Horizon: Paintings & Stories of an Artist's Life in the Yukon. Written and illustrated by Ted Harrison; introduction by Pierre Berton. Toronto: Merritt Publishing, 1980.
112 p.: ill. (some col.); 30 cm.
ISBN 0920886108
A Northern Alphabet. Written and illustrated by Ted Harrison. Montreal: Tundra Books, 1989, c1982.
30 p.: col. ill.; 21 x 27 cm.
ISBN 0887762093 (bound)
ISBN 0887762336 (pbk.)
O Canada. Written and illustrated by Ted Harrison. Toronto: Kids Can Press, 1992.
32 p.: col. ill.; 31 cm.
ISBN 1550740873
The Shooting of Dan McGrew. Written by Robert W. Service; illustrated by Ted Harrison. Toronto: Kids Can Press, 1988.
30 p.: col. ill.; 32 cm.
ISBN 0921103352
Books for Adults
Much Beloved Daughter: The Story of Florence Li Tim Oi. Written by Ted Harrison. Wilton, Connecticut: Morehouse-Barlow, 1985.
ix, 109 p.: ill., ports.; 21 cm.
ISBN 0819213780
Ted Harrison: A Brief. Written by Ted Harrison. Whitehorse, Yukon: T. Harrison, 1980.
4 p.: 28 cm.
(A brief to the Federal Cultural Policy Review Committee)
The World of Ted Harrison. Victoria, B.C.: Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, 1996.
14 p.: col. ill.; 28 cm.
ISBN 0888851553
(Catalogue of an exhibition held at the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, Sept. 20-Nov. 17, 1996)
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