The Collection of Mitzi & Mel Dobrin by Alan Klinkhoff Gallery

Works are available for immediate purchase and subject to prior sale. Those works of art without prices are sold.  Some paintings by Lawren S. Harris featured in the printed catalogue were formerly owned by Mitzi and Mel Dobrin and are not included in this online presentation. Please contact us for all inquiries.

Gallery Exhibition Dates
Toronto gallery: March 12-21
Montreal gallery: N/A
After the exhibition, works of art will be on exhibit in our galleries subject to availability.

Edwin Holgate was a rather shy and private person. His father had been an engineer, building railways, principally in Cuba.  He left Edwin well off financially.  Holgate and Jackson had served in the first war and had remained friends.  He was one of the members of the Group of Seven who had joined at a later date, not as one of the founders....

I visited the Holgates frequently at Morin Heights where he had built a fine house on a sight selected for him by "Jackrabbit" Johannsen who also became his contractor and of whom he painted a famous portrait, now in the Montreal Museum.  I purchased as many paintings from him as I could, which was usually not easy because he really did not like parting with any and did not need the money.  His wife, Frances, with whom he lived in the greatest harmony, was not allowed to enter his studio and she never knew what he was painting until it was finished.  She had been an accomplished concert pianist but when I knew them she had given up playing.

Holgate was highly respected by other artists….  Holgate had made some wonderful wood engravings, a discipline he had once taught at the Montreal Museum.  He still could make some prints within his limited edition and I bought them when I could.  Eventually he instructed me to give the wood blocks to the Museum as a gift and for study by students and artists. We acted as executors for the little that was left after the death of the artist, and we kept in touch with his widow.