The Group of Seven Outdoor Gallery started with a vision by the gallery’s artistic director Gerry Lantaigne and one mural in 1999. Lantaigne and the Downtown Huntsville Business Improvement Area (BIA) chose Tom Thomson and the Group of Seven, rather than the typical historical mural theme, because of the tie of these artists to Algonquin Park and the Huntsville area.

Thomson and his group of seven friends worked together in Toronto and used to take holiday painting trips in Algonquin Park.

Thomson developed some routes in Huntsville, as he dated a local Huntsville girl.  Along with Huntsville’s historic tie, the Group of Seven focus offers a unique approach to mural art.

What started as one mural, Jack Pine, hanging beside Kent Park, has gradually grown over the last nine years into the outdoor gallery. At first the BIA added one to three murals a year. At the end of 2006, we had 10 murals in the collection.  

Since the BIA’s goal is always to get more feet on the street, 10 murals were not quite enough to act as a tourist draw. So, expanding the outdoor gallery as an attraction for tourists and residents alike became the ongoing goal.

Last year, with support from the community and FedNor, the BIA held the first Group of Seven Mural Festival. During this two-week festival, the gallery grew by 10 murals, with 10 renowned Canadian mural artists painting at the same time. This created a lot of buzz and activity.

Within the festival, the community mural resulted in the most local attention.  Sponsored by the Huntsville Festival of the Arts, the painting of this mural was done by the community. All interested people were invited to help paint the community mural.

In the end over 1,300 people helped Lantaigne to paint the mural, which now hangs in the town square. As a result of the festival, Huntsville was host to the most recent Mural Routes’ national mural symposium, which helped to market our mural gallery nationally. The outdoor gallery has also been featured in Germany and on Chinese television programs.  Recently, the BIA was awarded the first Ontario BIA Association special events and promotions award for our mural festival.  

At the end of 2007, the gallery stood at more than 20 downtown mural recreations of famous works of art of the Group of Seven and Tom Thomson. The murals, along with the bronze Tom Thomson statue, form a walking tour in downtown Huntsville.   

That brings us to this year. There has been much interest in the gallery for 2008. There have been a number of school tours and community group tours, visiting bus tours are starting to include the outdoor gallery tour, and there has been some expansion of the gallery outside the downtown with a mural in Emsdale. Through bus tours and other tourists, our downtown businesses are seeing economic impact of our Group of Seven outdoor gallery.  

This spring the Huntsville High School, partnered with the Huntsville Festival of the Arts and the gallery to have Lantaigne direct some students in the making of mini-murals replicating sketch works by Thomson and Group of Seven. These 20 mini-murals will form a new component of the gallery, the Group of Seven Sketch Gallery. The sketch gallery will be hung on the outside of the high school and at Muskoka Heritage Place later this year. But, that is not enough for 2008. Two Group of Seven paintings will be recreated into life-size murals at the Dorset Museum July 8 to 15.  

Plus, given its amazing success, the outdoor gallery is pleased to announce the return of the Add Your Brush Stroke community mural to downtown Huntsville from July 28 to Aug. 3. All interested community members and visitors are welcome experience art in the making, as they help paint a blank canvas turned into our newest mural recreation, under the direction of Lantaigne. Lantaigne will be on site awaiting painters of all ages from noon to 5 p.m. during that week.

 Like Autumn’s Garland, hanging in the Town Square, this new community mural will be hung in a prominent location, on the back of the mural sponsor, TD Canada Trust’s wall, for all visiting the new River Mill Park to enjoy.  Last year’s community mural attracted 1,300 painters. Maybe there if a Guinness Book of World Record title for most painters on a mural waiting to be broken?  

Along with experiencing the mural creation in the making, visitors to downtown Huntsville can enjoy self-guided walking tours of the outdoor gallery year round.

So, all are encouraged to have a look at a few of the gallery murals today, or come back with family and friends and do the full tour.