Rolph Scarlett was one of an impressive gallery of noteworthy artists who came from Guelph. He was a pioneer in the genre of abstraction which, according to Canadian art historian Joan Murray, “for some is the primary force of art in the 20th century.” Scarlett was renowned as a modernist in the international art community. His biographer, Judith Nasby, wrote in her book Rolph Scarlett: Painter, Designer, Jeweller (2004), “He was a dedicated modernist inspired by his commitment to geometric abstraction.”
Rolph William Scarlett was born in Guelph on June 13, 1889, to James and Susan Scarlett, who resided on Queen Street. He attended St. George Public School, where he liked to participate in school plays. Rolph showed an interest in art, and at age 11 was awarded a certificate of merit for his drawings from the local school board. His grandmother encouraged him by giving him a paint box and some basic instruction in painting. Scarlett took private art classes with Sister Antoinette at the Loretto Academy for girls. This would be his only art-related education.
After graduating from St. George in 1902, Scarlett wanted to become an artist, but his father was not supportive. He arranged for Rolph to apprentice as a jeweller with his uncle who was the proprietor of W.A. Clark Jewellery on Wyndham Street. Young Scarlett spent the next four years learning about jewellery, watchmaking and repairs. Meanwhile, he studied and copied the paintings of old masters in order to further develop his artistic skills. He also participated in amateur theatrical productions in churches by constructing and painting sets.
In 1907, Scarlett went before Guelph city council with suggestions for how the lands along the Speed and Eramosa rivers could be beautified. He brought some paintings he had done to illustrate his ideas. The council members were impressed with the artwork, but didn’t act on the teenager’s suggestions.
At age 18, Scarlett took a train to New York City, where he stayed for the next four years. He met opera singer Edward Johnson, a fellow Guelphite, who was at the time performing with the Metropolitan Opera. The two formed a lifelong friendship.
Scarlett found work in New York as a jeweller, but spent much of his time painting and visiting the big city’s art galleries. He briefly studied with the Art Students League. It was also in New York that Scarlett met his first wife, Ruth.
In 1912, Scarlett returned to Guelph with Ruth and a baby son. In partnership with his childhood friend Bruce Metcalfe, Scarlett started up a theatrical company. They produced a comic opera called “The Gay Pierrots” which was a parody of the story of British suffragette Emmeline Pankhurst and her American colleague Lydia Pinkham. Scarlett wrote the songs, did the choreography, designed the sets and was the director. Metcalfe composed the musical score and conducted the orchestra. The production was staged at Griffin’s Opera House in Guelph on Feb. 16, 1914 and received a good review in the Mercury.
The First World War brought the theatrical enterprise to an end. Scarlett attempted to enlist in the army but was rejected for medical reasons. He went to work for the Massey-Harris Company manufacturing munitions. After the war he went back to New York where he was employed by the Omega Watch Company. On a business trip to Switzerland in 1923, he met the artist Paul Klee.
Klee encouraged Scarlett to explore modernism. Scarlett, under the influence of cubism, had already moved on from the naturalistic style of his early work. The ideas inspired by abstraction began to show not only in his paintings, but in his theatrical set designs, such as the work he did for a New York production called “Hoboken Blues.”
In 1926, still working in the jewellery business, Scarlett moved to Toledo, Ohio. He submitted his pastel work titled “Static” to the Toledo Museum of Art’s annual Federation of Art Societies exhibition. It was the first “futurist” art ever exhibited there, and was awarded first prize.
Two years later, Scarlett had a solo exhibition of 150 paintings and drawings at Columbia House in Toledo. His work drew large crowds, but his radical new style also stirred up controversy. Some art critics reacted negatively. Scarlett told one critic, “Derision means nothing to the modernist. If a futuristic picture brings the casual gallery patron to an abrupt stop and forces him to spend five minutes in an attempt to discover what it is all about, the ends of modernism have been served.”
Meanwhile, Scarlett designed sets for plays produced by Toledo’s Stage Club. A reviewer for the Toledo Sunday Times described the sets as “remarkably sculpturesque, remarkably beautiful.”
Scarlett met his second wife, Emily Pollet, in Toledo. She had two daughters from a previous marriage. The family lived in Guelph for a while, residing on Paisley Street. Then they moved to California, where, besides painting, Scarlett designed sets for movie studios. He also designed silver jewellery which showed influence of Navajo art.
Scarlett moved back to New York in 1937, and in 1939 he visited the newly-opened Museum of Non-Objective Painting (later re-named the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum). There he became acquainted with the works of modernist masters like the Russian artist Wassily Kandinsky and the German artist Rudolf Bauer. The museum’s director provided Scarlett with a Guggenheim Foundation fellowship which allowed him to paint full-time.
This was one of Scarlett’s most productive periods. He created works in oil, watercolour, gouache and monoprint. Some were exhibited in the museum and featured in its catalogue. Scarlett’s association with the Guggenheim Museum lasted 15 years, during which time the artist from Guelph was appointed its chief lecturer.
There was no limit to Scarlett’s ideas for modernist design. He worked on everything from a guided missile for the British War Office, to household items such as desk lamps, coffee pots and wine glasses. His paintings were exhibited in prestige galleries in New York, Chicago, Boston and other major cities across the United States.
Scarlett eventually moved to the artists’ colony in Woodstock, New York. He sometimes visited Guelph, where Bruce Metcalfe provided him with stones for his jewellery work. Scarlett died in Kingston, New York, in 1984. Today his work can be seen in the collections of numerous galleries in Canada and the US, including the Guggenheim Museum and of course the Macdonald Stewart Art Gallery at the University of Guelph.
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