Maria Tippett

Canadian historian

Maria W. Tippett (born 9 December 1944) is a Canadian historian specialising in Canadian art history. Her 1979 biography of Emily Carr won the Governor General's Award for English-language non-fiction.

Educated at Simon Fraser University and the University of London, Tippett has gone on to win several awards and has written extensive biographies of Emily Carr, Frederick Varley, Bill Reid, and Yousuf Karsh. Tippett has also written, among others, books on the photography of Charles Gimpel, the parents of the AIDS scientist David Ho, Canadian war art, landscape painting in addition to two collections of short stories. In addition to her writing, Tippett has held positions and fellowships at several universities, including Simon Fraser University, York University, Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, and Cambridge University.

## Biography[edit]

Raised in Victoria, British Columbia, Tippett travelled through Europe and the Middle East for three years following high school before attending Vancouver City College and Simon Fraser University.[1] She received a doctorate in history from the University of London.[2] From 1971 to 1983 she was married to Canadian Historian Douglas Cole. In 1991 she married Professor Peter Clarke, British historian and former Master of Trinity Hall, Cambridge University.

Until 1990, Tippett taught at Simon Fraser University, the University of British Columbia, Emily Carr College of Art and Design and was the Robarts Professor of Canadian Studies at York University, Toronto.

At Cambridge she was a visiting fellow at Clare Hall (1991–1992), then a research associate at the Scott Polar Research Institute (1993–95).[3] In 1995 she was appointed a senior research fellow and tutor at Churchill College, Cambridge (1995–2004).[2] Tippett was a member of the Cambridge Faculty of History from 1992 to 2004 and was chair of the Churchill College Art Gallery from 1997 to 2001. In 1997 she and Peter Clarke wrote the libretto for the opera, Churchill's Finest Hour, A Musical Burlesque in four acts, composed by Jeremy Thurlow of Churchill College, Cambridge.

In 2004, Tippett returned to Canada and was an associate research professor at Simon Fraser University from 2006 to 2010.[2][3]

Tippett was a member of the editorial board of The Canadian Historical Review, Canadian Art, Art Focus and an Arts Journalist Fellow at The Banff Centre in 1988. In 1992 she was elected a fellow of the Royal Society of Canada.[3] She has received honorary doctorates from the University of Windsor in 1994,[4] and from the University of Victoria (2006)[5] as well as from Simon Fraser University (2006).[6][3] In May 2014, Maria Tippett's name was added to Victoria High School's "Wall of Fame".

In the course of her career, Tippett has curated art exhibitions at Simon Fraser University Art Gallery (BC Canada), the London Region Art Gallery (Ontario, Canada), the National Library (Luxembourg), as well as at the Clare Hall Gallery at Cambridge University and the Art Gallery at Churchill College (Cambridge University). She has judged the Governor General's non-fiction Book Award and the BC Book Prize. She has lectured in South America, Europe, Japan, New Zealand, Australia in addition to Canada and the United States.

Tippett has also been a consultant and television presenter for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and the British Broadcasting Corporation. In 1998, Tippett was appointed to The Canadian Memorial Foundation, Canada House in London, where she was a member of the board until 2005. In 2010 she was a fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton. From 2012 to 2019, she was a member of the Craigdarroch Research Awards Committee at the University of Victoria and also a member of the President's Advisory Committee and the Dean of Fine and Performing Arts' Advisory Committee at the same institution. In 2021 Tippett became a member of the Advisory Board of The British Columbia Review and in 2023 joined the board of the British Columbia and Yukon Book Prizes.

## Works[edit]

### Books[edit]

* From Desolation to Splendour: Changing Perceptions of the British Columbia Landscape (1977) [with Douglas Cole][3]
* Phillips in Print: The Selected Writings of Walter J. Phillips on Canadian Nature and Art (1977) [with Douglas L. Cole][4]
* Emily Carr, A Biography (1979)[3]
* Art at the Service of War: Canada, Art, and the Great War (1984)
* Breaking the Cycle, and Other Stories from a Gulf Island (1989)
* Making Culture: English-Canadian Institutions and the Arts before the Massey Commission (1990)
* By a Lady: Celebrating Three Centuries of Art by Canadian Women (1992)
* Between Two Cultures: A Photographer among the Inuit (1994)
* Becoming Myself: A Memoir (1996)
* Stormy Weather: F.H. Varley, A Biography (1998)
* Bill Reid: The Making of an Indian (2004)
* Portrait in Light and Shadow: The Life of Yousuf Karsh (2007)
* Eating Bitter: A Chinese American Saga (2010)
* Made in British Columbia: Eight Ways of Making Culture (2015)
* Sculpture in Canada: A History (2017)
* Sculpture and its Relation to Writing, Music, Photography and Modernism (editor) (2020)
* Art for Art's Sake (2022)
* Canadian Art Matters, New Ways of Seeing (forthcoming)

### Papers[edit]

Selected List

* "A Life in History: From Making Culture to Making Cultural History" Canadian Historical Review, March (Vol 99 No. 1) 2018
* "Jeffrey Rubinoff and Canada" James Fox (ed). The Art of Jeffrey Rubinoff, (Vancouver: Douglas & McIntyre, 2016)
* "Art Made for Strangers': Re-Thinking Inuit Art" Sir Roy Calne and William O'Reilly (eds). Scepticism (New York: Nova Publishers, 2012)
* "Canadian Culture" Irvin Stubin (ed). What is a Canadian? (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 2006)
* "Expressing Identity" Beaver Magazine Vol 86 No 1 (2000)
* "Cultural History: A Subject in Search of a Agenda" Canadian Historical Review, Volume 5 No 3 (1994)
* "Canadian Art and the Great War" Franz K. Stanzel (ed)., Intimate Enemies: English-German literary reactions to the Great War (Heidelberg: Universitat verlag C. Winter, 1993)
* "Sea and Art" L.D. McCann (ed). The Sea and Culture of Atlantic Canada (Sackville: Mount Allison University, 1992)
* "The Origins of the Canada Council: the most generous sugar daddy art has ever known" in Peter Easingwood et al. Probing Canadian Culture (Augsburg: A-V Verlag, 1991)
* "Emily Carr" Michael Toobey (ed). True North: Canadian Landscape Painting 1896–1939 (London: Barbican Art Gallery, 1991)
* "Canadian Art and Propaganda During the Great War" Canadian High Commission, (London) [pamphlet] (1989)
* "The Making of English-Canadian Culture, 1900–1939: the external influences" [pamphlet] York University, 1988
* "The writing of English-Canadian cultural history, 1970–85." The Canadian Historical Review Volume 67, Issue 4 (1986).

### Exhibitions curated with catalogue[edit]

* Selected List
* "Contemporaries of Emily Carr" Simon Fraser University Art Gallery (1974)
* "Ingeborg Mohr, selected works" Simon Fraer University Art Gallery (1983)
* "Lest We Forget" London Regional Art Gallery (1989)
* "Charles Gimpel, photographer of Arctic Canada and Collector of Inuit Art" National Library, Luxembourg, (1995)
* "Marcel Barbeau", Churchill College Art Gallery, 2000.

## Awards and honours[edit]

* Butler Book Prize, 2018, short-listed, "Sculpture in Canada, a history"
* Melva J Dwyer Award, 2018, short-listed, "Sculpture in Canada, a history"
* Hubert Evans non-fiction Prize, 2016, short-listed, "Made in British Columbia, Eight Ways of Making Culture"
* Basil Stuart-Stubbs Book Prize, short-listed, 2016, "Made in British Columbia, Eight Ways of Making Culture"
* Canadian non-fiction Award, short-listed, 2007, Portrait in Light and Shadow: The Life of Yousuf Karsh
* Dafoe Book Prize, short-listed, 2008, "Portrait in Light and Shadow: The Life of Yousuf Karsh"
* Honorary doctorate, Simon Fraser University, 2006
* Honorary doctorate, University of Victoria, 2006
* Hubert Evans non-fiction Prize, 2004, "Bill Reid, the making of an Indian"
* Honorary L.L.D., Windsor University, 1994
* BC Book Prize, short-listed, 1993, "By a Lady, Celebrating Three Centuries of Art by Canadian Women"
* Van City Book Prize, short-listed, 1993, "By a Lady, Celebrating Three Centuries of Art by Canadian Women"
* Canada 125 Medal, 1992
* elected a fellow of the Royal Society of Canada.[3] in 1992
* Canadian Studies Writing Award, 1982
* Governor General's Award for non-fiction, 1979, "Emily Carr: a biography"
* John A. Macdonald History Prize, 1979, "Emily Carr: a biography"
* Garneau Medal, short-listed, 1980, "Emily Carr: a biography"
* Eaton's BC Book Award – now the BC and Yukon Book Prize, 1978, "From Desolation to Splendour: changing perceptions of the British Columbia Landscape" [3]

## References[edit]

1. ^ Charlotte Gray. "An Author Discovers Herself Maria Tippett: Becoming Myself, A Memoir by Maria Tippett Stoddart" Toronto Star. 30 November 1996
2. ^ a b c "Hard work wins respect". archive.is. 28 June 2013. Archived from the original on 28 June 2013. Retrieved 16 February 2019.
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Canadian Who's Who 2012–2013 Volume XLVII, Third Sector Publishing, Orillia, Ontario, Distributed by University of Toronto Press
4. ^ "Recipients" (PDF). www.uwindsor.ca. U of Windsor. Retrieved 27 September 2023.
5. ^ "Recipients". www.uvic.ca. uvic. Retrieved 27 September 2023.
6. ^ "Recipients". www.sfu.ca. SFU. Retrieved 27 September 2023.

* v
* t
* e

Winners of the Governor General's Award for English-language non-fiction

1930s|

* Thomas Beattie Roberton, TBR: Newspaper Pieces (1936)
* Stephen Leacock, My Discovery of the West (1937)
* John Murray Gibbon, Canadian Mosaic (1938)
* Laura Salverson, Confessions of an Immigrant's Daughter (1939)

1940s|

* J. F. C. Wright, Slava Bohu (1940)
* Emily Carr, Klee Wyck (1941)
* Bruce Hutchison, The Unknown Country (1942)
* Edgar McInnis, The Unguarded Frontier (1942)
* E. K. Brown, On Canadian Poetry (1943)
* John Robins, The Incomplete Anglers (1943)
* Dorothy Duncan, Partner in Three Worlds (1944)
* Edgar McInnis, The War: Fourth Year (1944)
* Ross Munro, Gauntlet to Overlord (1945)
* Evelyn M. Richardson, We Keep a Light (1945)
* Frederick Phillip Grove, In Search of Myself (1946)
* Arthur R. M. Lower, Colony to Nation (1946)
* William Sclater, Haida (1947)
* Robert MacGregor Dawson, The Government of Canada (1947)
* Thomas Head Raddall, Halifax, Warden of the North (1948)
* C. P. Stacey, The Canadian Army, 1939-1945 (1948)
* Hugh MacLennan, Cross-country (1949)
* Robert MacGregor Dawson, Democratic Government in Canada (1949)

1950s|

* Marjorie Wilkins Campbell, The Saskatchewan (1950)
* W. L. Morton, The Progressive Party in Canada (1950)
* Frank MacKinnon, The Progressive Party in Canada (1951)
* Josephine Phelan, The Ardent Exile (1951)
* Donald G. Creighton, John A. Macdonald, The Young Politician (1952)
* Bruce Hutchison, The Incredible Canadian (1952)
* J. M. S. Careless, Canada, A Story of Challenge (1953)
* N. J. Berrill, Sex and the Nature of Things (1953)
* Hugh MacLennan, Thirty and Three (1954)
* Arthur R. M. Lower, This Most Famous Stream (1954)
* N. J. Berrill, Man's Emerging Mind (1955)
* Donald G. Creighton, John A. Macdonald, The Old Chieftain (1955)
* Pierre Berton, The Mysterious North (1956)
* Joseph Lister Rutledge, Century of Conflict (1956)
* Thomas H. Raddall, The Path of Destiny (1957)
* Bruce Hutchison, Canada: Tomorrow's Giant (1957)
* Pierre Berton, Klondike (1958)
* Joyce Hemlow, The History of Fanny Burney (1958)
* [No award] (1959)

1960s|

* Frank Underhill, In Search of Canadian Liberalism (1960)
* T. A. Goudge, The Ascent of Life (1961)
* Marshall McLuhan, The Gutenberg Galaxy (1962)
* J.M.S. Careless, Brown of the Globe (1963)
* Phyllis Grosskurth, John Addington Symonds (1964)
* James Eayrs, In Defence of Canada (1965)
* George Woodcock, The Crystal Spirit: A Study of George Orwell (1966)
* Norah Story, The Oxford Companion to Canadian History and Literature (1967)
* Mordecai Richler, Hunting Tigers Under Glass (1968)
* [No award] (1969)

1970s|

* [No award] (1970)
* Pierre Berton, The Last Spike (1971)
* [No award] (1972)
* Michael Bell, Painters in a New Land (1973)
* Charles Ritchie, The Siren Years (1974)
* Marion MacRae and Anthony Adamson, Hallowed Walls (1975)
* Carl Berger, The Writing of Canadian History (1976)
* F. R. Scott, Essays on the Constitution (1977)
* Roger Caron, Go-Boy! Memories of a Life Behind Bars (1978)
* Maria Tippett, Emily Carr (1979)
* Robert Bothwell and William Kilbourn, C.D. Howe (1979)
* Larry Pratt and John Richards, Prairie Capitalism (1979)

1980s|

* Jeffrey Simpson, Discipline of Power: The Conservative Interlude and the Liberal Restoration (1980)
* George Calef, Caribou and the Barren-Land (1981)
* Christopher Moore, Louisbourg Portraits: Life in an Eighteenth- Century Garrison Town (1982)
* Jeffery Williams, Byng of Vimy: General and Governor General (1983)
* Sandra Gwyn, The Private Capital: Ambition and Love in the Age of Macdonald and Laurier (1984)
* Ramsay Cook, The Regenerators: Social Criticism in Late Victorian English Canada (1985)
* Northrop Frye, Northrop Frye on Shakespeare (1986)
* Michael Ignatieff, The Russian Album (1987)
* Anne Collins, In the Sleep Room (1988)
* Robert Calder, Willie: The Life of W. Somerset Maugham (1989)

1990s|

* Stephen Clarkson and Christina McCall, Trudeau and Our Times (1990)
* Robert Hunter and Robert Calihoo, Occupied Canada: A Young White Man Discovers His Unsuspected Past (1991)
* Maggie Siggins, Revenge of the Land: A Century of Greed, Tragedy and Murder on a Saskatchewan Farm (1992)
* Karen Connelly, Touch the Dragon (1993)
* John Livingston, Rogue Primate: An Exploration of Human Domestication (1994)
* Rosemary Sullivan, Shadow Maker: The Life of Gwendolyn MacEwen (1995)
* John Ralston Saul, The Unconscious Civilization (1996)
* Rachel Manley, Drumblair: Memories of a Jamaican Childhood (1997)
* David Adams Richards, Lines on the Water: A Fisherman's Life on the Miramichi (1998)
* Marq de Villiers, Water (1999)

2000s|

* Nega Mezlekia, Notes from the Hyena's Belly (2000)
* Thomas Homer-Dixon, The Ingenuity Gap (2001)
* Andrew Nikiforuk, Saboteurs: Wiebo Ludwig's War Against Big Oil (2002)
* Margaret MacMillan, Paris 1919: Six Months That Changed the World (2003)
* Roméo Dallaire, Shake Hands With the Devil: The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda (2004)
* John Vaillant, The Golden Spruce: A True Story of Myth, Madness and Greed (2005)
* Ross King, The Judgment of Paris: The Revolutionary Decade That Gave the World Impressionism (2006)
* Karolyn Smardz Frost, I've Got a Home in Glory Land: A Lost Tale of the Underground Railroad (2007)
* Christie Blatchford, Fifteen Days: Stories of Bravery, Friendship, Life and Death from Inside the New Canadian Army (2008)
* M. G. Vassanji, A Place Within: Rediscovering India (2009)

2010s|

* Allan Casey, Lakeland: Journeys into the Soul of Canada (2010)
* Charles Foran, Mordecai: The Life and Times (2011)
* Ross King, Leonardo and the Last Supper (2012)
* Sandra Djwa, Journey with No Maps: A Life of P.K. Page (2013)
* Michael John Harris, The End of Absence: Reclaiming What We’ve Lost in a World of Constant Connection (2014)
* Mark L. Winston, Bee Time: Lessons from the Hive (2015)
* Bill Waiser, A World We Have Lost: Saskatchewan Before 1905 (2016)
* Graeme Wood, The Way of the Strangers: Encounters with the Islamic State (2017)
* Darrel J. McLeod, Mamaskatch: A Cree Coming of Age' (2018)
* Don Gillmor, To the River: Losing My Brother (2019)

2020s|

* Madhur Anand, This Red Line Goes Straight to Your Heart (2020)
* Sadiqa de Meijer, alfabet/alphabet: a memoir of a first language (2021)
* Eli Baxter, Aki-wayn-zih: A Person as Worthy as the Earth (2022)
* Kyo Maclear, Unearthing (2023)

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