Robert Pope Archive

Robert was often influenced by the lyrics to popular songs. The Elvis song, “Lord, You Gave Me a Mountain,” written by Marty Robbins (1968) is a gospel-flavoured dialogue with God, a tale of pain and bewilderment, a hard life surviving

Robert draws his own feet on a hospital bed and a window in a bare room opening to a world outside that is inaccessible to him, yet a source of dream and hope. This drawing, made in a downtown Toronto hospital, pictures

The activity of knitting adds a note of normality to the patient’s condition. Daily routines take on increased importance. The red knitted object placed near the woman’s heart suggests hers is a labour of love. Even as she undergoes treatment

Robert had drawn a study of a patient lying before a closed curtain. He showed this drawing to his brother Doug, who suggested adding a second figure glimpsed behind the curtain. Doug was a student of 19th century literature and fascinated

Clocks often appear in Robert’s work, especially after his illness. One thinks his drawings of Terry Fox jogging past Halifax’s Old Town Clock, or of the clocks that appear in his images of waiting rooms. This de Chirico-like scene, combining

Friendship was always important to Robert, who faithfully kept every letter, card and note ever written to him. Study notes show how the artist planned the image Visitors to be divided into three sections, right, left and center, each conveying

Robert’s third version of the doctor examining a patient reaches back into art history to quote Goya’s Self-portrait with Dr. Arrieta, the physician who Goya credits with saving his life. Goya’s painting is both a grateful tribute and a pieta

Nurses, like angels, assist a patient, weakened from a long convalescence or possibly a stroke, to get back on his feet. It looks as though a grown man is relearning to walk. This is the start of a journey back to

Compare this image to Robert’s earlier series about lovers, “A Seal Upon Thine Heart.” In the earlier series, there is a strong feeling of compulsion, bewilderment, loss of control, even at times a feeling of antagonism, as if a battle

The view from the window of spring-time trees in first leaf and blossom, the atmosphere of burgeoning life, contrasts with the patient’s sense of confinement and immobility. The world outside becomes a dream-like fantasy the patient longs to be a