Artists have often captured the beautiful and sublime, nature or a park, but how often do artists draw on Montreal’s early industrial history for their inspiration? Scott MacLeod has seized upon a vanishing history that of the Lachine Canal, a historic artery of Canada’s industrial history rapidly changing into a residential and recreational place.

The Lachine Canal is a living legacy of Canada’s economic and social 
history. Once a 14.5-kilometer water route linking Montreal’s Old Port to Lake St. Louis the canal opened in 1825. When the St. Lawrence Seaway opened in 1970 a long history of canal shipping ended. Scott MacLeod’s paintings and drawings bring out the essence of the industrial era, and art becomes a vehicle for expressing a context of buildings, bridges, cranes, docks, and boats that part of life for Canadians.

A source of hydraulic power this industrial corridor was one of the main manufacturing production centres in Canada from the mid-19th century to Second World War, the Canal will change rapidly over the next 20 years as the City of Montreal redevelops its waterfront areas into housing, loft, and recreation areas with walking and bicycle paths and boating along its waterfront.

Industrial architecture with a past history, a living museum in the present, carries all the traces and markings of its past with a quiet majesty. Artists seldom document the areas that do not display a certain wealth, and Scott MacLeod is a rare individual for he has captured these scenes with a bright and accomplished series of oil and graphite works.

The paintings and sketches in this show range from a Railway Bridge to the Five Roses Flour Mill building. An old iron bridge becomes a sublime piece of sculpture while a 75-ton Floating Crane used to unload goods stands starkly against the sky. The Canadian Pacific Railway Bridge is pure beautiful engineering and in another work a boat sits in Lock No. 5 lit up by night-lights. Some subjects such as the Redpath Sugar, Northern Electric and Corticelli Buildings or 'Jackknife Bridge' becomes panoramic paintings that recreate the feeling that the Lachine Canal with its coal derricks, Coleco Building, Canada Malting Building is a living museum of industrial building and marine artifacts. The majesty and industrial history of Canada is nowhere more evident than in the Lachine Canal. Scott MacLeod brings it to life. For its generous support of Scott MacLeod’s exhibition, and understanding of the proud heritage that the Lachine Canal and its architecture represent, Montreal’s McAuslan Brewery should be warmly thanked.

- John K. Grande