Ed Bartram, a Canadian artist who was renowned for capturing Georgian Bay’s dramatic and rugged landscape with images of rock formations, has died. He was 81.

For more than 50 years, Bartram documented the beauty of Georgian Bay in his paintings, prints and photographs. He was especially famous for his vivid rockscapes, showcasing patterns, textures and lichen.

His etchings and paintings can be found in public, corporate and private collections in North America, Europe and Asia.

Sarah Milroy, chief curator of the McMichael Canadian Art Collection in Kleinburg, Ont., associates Bartram’s work most closely with the landscape of Georgian Bay, located about 150 km. north of Toronto.

“His work captures the sense one has of the density of that ancient rock, the sense of geological time compressed in these primordial layers,” she said. “Given that what he is rendering is rock, it is striking that he can make the subject seem so alive.”

In his book Rockscapes of Georgian Bay, published by Fitzhenry and Whiteside, Bartram explained his creative process.

“Rather than using the traditional landscape composition of the Group of Seven, I often take a more intimate viewpoint, where the rock surface, itself, becomes the subject of the work of art,” he wrote. “Within the structure of the rock, I find patterns which become abstract landscapes themselves and capture the essence of the windswept north.’ ”

Those patterns helped to fuel his art.

Gisella Giacalone, owner and director of Toronto’s Mira Godard Gallery, which represented Bartram for more than 40 years, said those familiar with Georgian Bay will look at his paintings “and know exactly what he’s painted, even when it comes to the abstract paintings.

“He’s captured that kind of beautiful, rugged, pristine Georgian Bay area. It’s a spot in Canada that was near and dear to him.”

Born in 1938, in London, Ont., Bartram’s father was a cardiologist and his mother was a former dessert chef and amateur artist. From an early age, she encouraged Bartram, and his brother, to express themselves through art, buying old roller blinds to cut up and use as canvas.

He fell in love with Georgian Bay, home to 30,000 islands, when he attended Camp Hurontario, a boys’ summer camp. His affection deepened when he worked there as a camp counsellor, teaching art and leading canoe trips.

During one of those trips, he spotted a deserted island with the ruins of an old cabin. He often took the campers to that island for cookouts and to sit on the rocks, with paintbrush in hand, looking for inspiration in their surroundings.

After high school, he briefly pursued medicine, but eventually graduated from the University of Western Ontario with a Bachelor of Arts. He then attended the University of Toronto, obtaining a master’s degree in art and archaeology. Making art was his passion, but he struggled as a young artist, so he turned to teaching as a way to supplement his income.

In 1965, his first year as an arts high school teacher, he borrowed money to buy the deserted four-hectare island in Georgian Bay that he was so enamoured with, paying about $7,500 for it.

That island, along with the cottage and art studio he built on it, became a summer retreat; when he wasn’t there, he was at his home in King Township.

On the island, Bartram spent countless hours on his art and relished explaining to friends and visitors the geological history of the rocks.

“These rocks are Precambrian. They are older than life itself …. They are the oldest rocks in the world,” he told Star reporter Janice Mawhinney in 2002, when she visited him on the island for a feature story. “I try to give a feeling of the Canadian North, a feeling of going back in time to the formation of the crust of the earth, itself, and the primordial forces and powers of that creation.”

Around 1970, his series of works inspired by Georgian Bay rocks helped establish his reputation as an artist.

“The uniqueness of his work was his subject,” said professional artist Jean-Claude Bergeron, who now runs Galerie d’art Jean-Claude Bergeron in Ottawa.

“It’s very Canadian.”

Bergeron, who first met Bartram in the early 1970s when their art was displayed at the same exhibit, described him as “one of the best printmakers in Canada.”

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In 1975, while teaching art history and printmaking to adults as part of an art diploma course at Central Technical School, Bartram met Mary Bromley, a budding artist who was his student.

“Ed was the most exciting art history teacher. He just brought it all alive,” recalled Bromley, an artist, potter and environmental activist.

“He was so generous, and open, and interested in people,” said Bromley.

“I so loved Ed’s work.”

The couple married in 1980 and had a daughter named Jessica Bromley Bartram.

His enthusiasm as an educator extended beyond the classroom, says Jessica. Whenever she had an art history project or test, her father “would go into art-history-teacher-mode.”

“He’d be right there pulling out books and I’d be going, ‘No. I just need to study the stuff that’s on the paper.’ And he’d be saying, ‘No. You have to read about this additional thing. It will make it richer.’ ”

Jessica, an illustrator and writer, says her father always supported her passion for art. But Bartram, who wasn’t a self-promoter and had never been comfortable with the business side of art, was also realistic with his daughter about the challenges she could face in trying to make it in the art world.

“He was always the most encouraging,” said Jessica, 34. “He was so proud of everything I did, and was very vocal about how proud he was, which was really wonderful.”

In 1985, Bartram began teaching printmaking at the Ontario College of Art and Design University, where he worked for nearly two decades.

“He was genuinely enjoyed by his students,” recalls Michèle White, an art professor at OCAD University. White adds he instilled in them “a love of the environment and the land.”

She describes Bartram as “a very humble person,” who “never sought any kind of real fame or fortune.”

“He never took up anything, both in his work as an artist and as a teacher, because it was favourable, or current, or popular,” she said. “He was just a really decent, nice, dependable human being.”

“I think he was very, very conscious of being a gentle person. And his art comes across that way, too. There’s a gentle and sensitive connection with the landscape …. There was no bravado.

“It was a quiet examination of nature.”

In 2003, Bartram retired from teaching, dedicating himself full-time to his art. He worked as an artist until his death.

About three weeks ago he collapsed at his island home, and died in hospital on Aug. 25.

A celebration of Bartram’s life is planned for November in Toronto. No date has been set.

The family plans to scatter his ashes on the island.