Gertrude Kearns

Kearns was born in 1950 in St. John's Newfoundland, to father Frederic Steiger (1899-1990) and Ruby (born Hall, adopted Fevens) Steiger, while her father was on a year long commission (1950-1951) by Premier Joey Smallwood to paint all the former Speakers and Prime Ministers of Newfoundland pre Confederation. Early 1951 the now family of three returned to their Toronto home in Weston. Ontario.[1] She attended Richview Collegiate in Etobicoke. In 1973 she completed her piano studies at the Royal Conservatory of Music, Univ. of Toronto, ARCT (Piano-Performer and Teacher). She was basically self-taught as a visual artist though she grew up with constant studio exposure up to 1990 to visual artist Frederic Steiger.

Gertrude Steiger Kearns, C.M. was appointed as Member of the Order of Canada June 27, 2019 “for her contributions to preserving and understanding Canadian war history as a contemporary artist.” A driving motivation in her conflict-related paintings and image/text print making is straddling the line between military and war art. She has worked both officially and unofficially as a war/military artist for over two decades. In 2017, she lectured to Toronto Friends of the Visual Arts, as part of the Canada 150 Lecture Series. She has been included in Canadian Who's Who since 2014 and was appointed Honourary War Artist to the Royal Canadian Military Institute, Toronto in 2019. Her work is represented on the Centre for Contemporary Canadian Art database (CCCA).

Inspired by the Gulf War, Kearns produced the Gulf Crisis series, 1991, which was exhibited with artist Theo Willemse at 675 King Street West, Toronto as INDEPENDENT and NON-ALIGNED. This began her foray into war art first with a focus on researched Canadian Forces military experiences in the Balkans, Somalia and Rwanda. By 1997, the War Museum housed two of her paintings of Kyle Brown and later accepted her MacKenzie and Dallaire portraits.[1] Kearns was accepted into the Canadian Forces Artists Program 2003–2005. In 2005, after participating via CFAP in a 2004 CF Reservist training exercise in Petawawa, Kearns was on contract with Task Force Afghanistan under Task Force Commander Colonel S P Noonan as official war artist embedded in Kandahar from December 2005 until January 2006. Kearns was commissioned to stay with Canadian soldiers in Kandahar and later Kabul to create six paintings from that experience.[2] [3] On return to Toronto Kearns completed a three-panel painting titled "What They Gave," which included an image of three wounded men in hospital settings.[4] By late 2006 she started what would become a twelve-year independent non-commissioned project on Afghanistan, with a focus on senior command. The seventy works would conclude in 2018 with a Canadian Special Forces Counter-terrorism group of works.

In 2005, two of her art pieces depicting Canadian soldiers, specifically Kyle Brown, torturing Shidane Arone, were displayed at the Canadian War Museum. As a result, boycotts arose from Clifford Chadderton and National Council of Veterans Associations who did not want such contents on display.[6] In 2003 Kearns showed BLUE YELLOW BLACK abstract works at Lehmann Leskiw. 2003-2005 she developed a body of work with her subject John Bentley Mays. An unanticipated 'one sitting' became four from which she developed 'United States of Being: the john bentley mays portraits' which was also shown at Lehmann Lesliw Fine Art Toronto in 2005. The series responded to "psychological conflict and the transitory nature of resolution in the face of intellect and depression."[7] Kearns eventually compiled her Afghan war art into an exhibit titled "The Art of Command: Portraits and Posters from Canada's Afghan Mission."[8] In 2008 Kearns' Dallaire and John Bentley Mays portraits appeared in Carte Blanche, Vol. 2: Painting 2008 (established category) The Magenta Foundation; ART + WAR, I.B.Taurus, London UK, Dr. Laura Brandon. In 2008, Kearns was commissioned by the Royal Canadian Military Institute's president Matthew Gaasenbeek, with the patronage of Kathryn Langley Hope, to paint Tecumseh and Brock, the Shawnee Indian leader and British major-general who fought in the War of 1812.[9] In 2010 Kearns showed a group of 5 works titled ARCHITECTURAL DIGESTIONS at ANGELL Gallery Toronto. By 2011, Kearns was back to working on creating 24 war posters, specifically images of prominent Canadian soldiers. Despite the willingness of the Canadian military to accept her work, Kearns found that commercial galleries were unwilling to display her art for not being “subversive enough.”[10] During 2010 Kearns realized a double portrait commission of Julian and Kaaren Brown, co-founders of the Canadian national competition, ‘The Kingston Prize for Portraiture'. In 2015 she attended the Canadian Security Studies Program, Canadian Forces College. In 2014 her work was included in Landscapes of War and Memory: The Two World Wars in Canadian Literature and the Arts’ University of Alberta Press, Dr Sherrill Grace. In 2015, the Fort York Visitor Centre displayed Kearns' military art exhibit "The Art of Command: Portraits and Posters from Canada’s Afghan Mission."[11][12] The further developed series was exhibited at Founders' Gallery The Military Museums in 2016 and with new works at Canadian Forces College 2017–2018. March 7, 2017 Kearns was a ‘Canada 150 Lecture series speaker as a Canadian war artist’, at WAAC, invitation by Toronto Friends of the Visual Arts. 2018-2019 saw a U.S. military project with General David H Petraeus as subject. Her most recent Canadian subjects are The Honourable Hugh Segal, Dr. Janice Stein and in 2020 four works of Major-General Jennie Carignan in the context of her NATO MISSION IRAQ Command. Kearns’ works are in private and institutional collections in Canada including The Massey College Collection, U of T; The Beaverbrook Collection of War Art, Canadian War Museum, Ottawa; Art Gallery of Nova Scotia Collection; Department of National Defence; Royal Canadian Military Institute, Toronto; Canadian Forces College, Canadian Defence Academy, Toronto; and internationally The National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC. In June 2019, Kearns was named a Member of the Order of Canada.[13]