Identity area
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Authorized form of name
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Description area
Dates of existence
History
Elaine Russel Harrison was born on 19 June 1915 in Petite-Rivere, Nova Scotia, to Rev. George R. Harrison and Minerva (Barnes) Harrison. She began her post-secondary education at Kings College, Halifax, in 1933, and graduated from Dalhouise University in 1937. The same year Elaine moved with her family to Summerside, Prince Edward Island. In 1938 Elaine started her teaching career in Summerside where she taught for thirty years. Elaine resided with her companion, Eleanor Ressor Wheler, in Bedeque and at their summer home “Windswept” in Fernwood.
In addition to being a teacher, Elaine was writer, poet, publisher, and environmentalist, but she was best known as a painter and visual artist. Largely self-taught, she counted Tom Thompson and the Group of Seven, Emily Carr, Picasso, and Van Gough among her most significant influences. Elaine was involved in the PEI Art Society in the 1950s but it wasn’t until her retirement from teaching in 1968 that painting became a focus of her work. Her paintings appeared in solo and group exhibitions and in galleries across the province. Fifty of Elaine’s paintings along with a selection of her poetry were showcased in an exhibit entitled “Elaine Harrison: I am an Island that Dreams” at the Confederation Centre Art Gallery in Charlottetown (October 2011-January 2012).
Elaine Russel Harrison died at her home in Bedeque on 16 June 2003.