Thor Hansen’s Canadian Printed Textiles
The Textile Museum of Canada houses more than 15,000 textiles and related objects, spanning thousands of years and more than 200 regions. Each month, we’ll highlight a different object (or objects), offering insight into the artists, stories, techniques, and materials that make up our global collection.
For this latest instalment of our Collection Spotlight, we’re looking at a small but significant group of printed textiles by Danish-born Canadian designer Thor Hansen, a champion of Canadian design who was inspired by this country’s art and natural landscapes.
Written by Julia Brucculieri
Thor Hansen came to Canada via Denmark in the late 1920s, though it wasn’t necessarily planned. According to Rachel Gotlieb, a craft and design historian and curator of the Textile Museum of Canada’s 2005 exhibition, Thor Hansen: Crafting a Canadian Style, Hansen won a ticket to travel to Japan but was so inspired by the scenic illustrations on Canadian Pacific posters, he decided to change his route.¹
Once in Canada, Hansen, along with his wife, opened a craft shop in Regina to sell their needlework, hats, and scarves.² They closed the shop during the Depression, and Hansen went on to work for the British-American Oil Company in 1938. Starting as a clerical worker, the mostly self-taught designer would eventually become the company’s art director, responsible for designing the Toronto headquarters and developing interior design schemes for additional offices in Vancouver, Montreal, Calgary, Winnipeg, and Ottawa, among others.³
Hansen was an advocate for supporting and uplifting Canadian design; he worked with several Canadian artists and artisans (such as metalsmith Nancy Meek Pocock) to adapt his designs into all elements of the corporate setting, from woodcarvings (as seen in this video from the Huronia Museum) and murals to drapery and radiator grills.⁴ Hansen viewed all areas of craft as art; he did not subscribe to antiquated hierarchies that saw craft as less than art.
Hanging in the reception area of the Toronto office was a wall hanging with Hansen’s Geese in Flight/Sundridge design. The title of this design comes from the town of the same name, and according to Gotlieb, it became Hansen’s signature.⁵ Sundridge portrays Canadian geese flying among a landscape of coniferous trees, with a meandering horizon and a graphic clouded skyline. The Textile Museum of Canada has an example of Hansen’s Sundridge in the form of a printed textile yardage produced by A.B. Caya, a fabric company formerly based in Kitchener.
In 1954, Hansen and A.B. Caya collaborated on a collection of “Canadian inspired HAND-PRINTS,” which saw several of his designs – including Heron Bay and Tundra – reproduced on printed textiles for the home.⁶ Examples of both Heron Bay and Tundra can also be found in the Museum’s collection.
These designs by Hansen illustrate his go-to motifs, inspired by the nature-based imagery he found in books and museum collections, and of course, those Canadian Pacific Railway posters, with their bold graphic shapes and striking landscape illustrations. The designer often depicted flying birds (as with Sundridge, Heron Bay, and Gaspé), horned animals, and native plants and wildflowers. In addition, the colour schemes in his printed fabrics in particular are reflective of the Mid-Century Modern era of design, during which shades like salmon and blush pink, avocado green, sky blue, and turquoise were quite popular.⁷
As he worked toward developing his version of a Canadian aesthetic, Hansen also drew inspiration from folk art motifs and First Nations imagery; he is said to have referenced books such as Alice Ravenhill’s An Outline of the Arts and Crafts of the Indian Tribes of British Columbia. As Gotlieb points out, Hansen’s practice of cultural appropriation came with valid criticisms. Former head of the textile department at the Royal Ontario Museum Harold Burnham was once quoted as saying Canadians “have no more right to claim the designs of Ojibwe beadwork or West-Coast Indian carving as part of our own peculiar heritage than we have to claim designs that come from Asia or Africa.”⁸ (On the contrary, Burnham also once said Canadian artists should be able to draw on global cultural influences, to avoid being seen as “provincial.”)⁹
Decades later, conversations and debates on cultural appropriation continue, and in the context of Hansen’s work, these are important contexts to consider. In addition, while the Hansen did notably work with Canadian artists, it’s unclear how much collaboration, if any, he engaged in with the First Nations artists he was inspired by.
Still, Hansen’s own work and his advocacy for craft left a lasting mark on Canadian design. Not only is his work included in the Textile Museum’s collection, you can also find Hansen’s art at the ROM, and the Huronia Museum.
If you’d like to learn more about Hansen, his designs, and his advocacy for Canadian craft, purchase a copy of Thor Hansen: Crafting a Canadian Style from the Museum’s shop.
