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Alexander Colville 1920 - Canadian pencil, ink and acrylic on paper Seeing-eye Dog, Man and Bridge " 6 x 10 3/8 inches 15.2 x 26.3 centimeters signed and dated 1968 Literature:Helen Dow, The Art of Alex Colville, 1972, page 90, reproduced plate 39 David Burnett, Colville, Art Gallery of Ontario, 1983, an earlier pencil drawing of this image entitled Study for Seeing-eye Dog and Man reproduced page 208 Provenance:Marlborough Galleries, London, England Private Collection, Toronto Exhibited:Kestner-Gesellschaft, Hanover, Germany, Katalog 7, Alex Colville, 1969, catalogue #26 Mira Godard Gallery, Toronto in collaboration with Fischer Fine Art, London, England, September, 1978 The relationship between people and dogs is a theme that Colville explores quite frequently. Helen Dow refers to Colville's respect and admiration for animals, writing, ""Colville sees in the divine order of subhuman creatures the natural model which humanity should strive to emulate.....Seeing-eye Dog, Man and Bridge is a rich play on this theme."" This is one of only three ink and acrylic drawings considered finished works rather than studies by the artist. Included with this lot is correspondence between the artist and the owner of this work, as well as a dealer. A 1970 letter explains that this drawing was one of only a handful of works completed while Colville was teaching at the University of Santa Cruz in California in 1968. He writes: ".....when I returned to Canada in June 1968 and began to paint again, my next work, My Father with his Dog, was thematically, though not formally, related to this drawing.....The idea came to me from my musing about a blind man and dog who used to frequent the barber shop which I went to in Santa Cruz. The bridge in the drawing is a Southern Pacific railway bridge." Included with this lot are various letters, eight altogether, between Colville and the owner's wife and John Erle-Drax of Marlborough Galleries and later Fischer Fine Art.