Three small 'portable art gallery' books are now published! This completes the book set of the best of the prairie works that were scanned.
~ Fritz Stehwien Gallery
Saturday, 26 February 2022
Prairies captured
Wednesday, 29 September 2021
Insights
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Barbara sorting and scanning |
'Welcome to the wonderful chaos' that is the Fritz Stehwien Gallery still - 13 years later. All is much more organized and digitized, but no less overwhelming.
Listen here: https://www.buzzsprout.com/1660786/9277238
as SaskScapes podcaster Kevin Power visits the Gallery Garage for a chat with Fritz's youngest daughter, the current keeper of the massive collection of family art.
Some delightful insights into the life and times, as well as a look at part of the remaining collection of Stehwien art on display and stored on site.
Thank you Kevin Power - it is indeed an honour to be SaskScapes' first podcast from a garage!
Saturday, 21 August 2021
An exciting development
Street naming in Saskatoon has designated the red marked street in a new residential development: the Stehwien Street, to honour Fritz Stehwien.
This nomination was given to Fritz for his 90th birthday, but he was not around to see it approved in 2014. The new Aspen Ridge area is being developed in phases, so it make take a few more years before taking a tour is possible.
An unexpected development is that while a park naming was applied for, where the full name is used, the street naming leaves the dedication open to all Stehwien artists! This is especially great for Waltraude Stehwien who is still creating scissorcuts and was very active alongside her husband in the 50plus years living in Saskatoon and making many contributions to the greater community.
Thursday, 18 March 2021
"Paint that Bridge when you get to it"
While Fritz no doubt crossed a lot of bridges in his lifetime, he likely painted as many!
With a major portion of the archiving and documentation complete, this wonderful review of Scenic Bridges is a great addition to illustrating his life and times:
More details on the Stehwien Art virtual gallery with giftshop can be found here: https://www.stehwien.art/
Sunday, 14 February 2021
75 Years Ago
The forged papers, as well as many artworks survived (winter scene shown in blog header above). The story has now been compiled, along with images of these artworks, in the following book:
The Power of a Paintbrush
Also in German: Die Macht des Pinsels
The cover of the book features the prison release papers, front and back, enlarged to show detail. The stamp, the signatures and what appears to be authorized names and dates were all meticulously painted with a fine brush.
Available through SaskBooks https://www.skbooks.com/
Monday, 17 August 2020
5000 and counting!
Current count for the archives: 5,175 images! Scanning is complete, except for the framed works.
Updates will continue as lost works are traced through existing slides and photos, where found. Information on sold and donated items will also continue.
A slow, but very exciting process, especially when making discoveries of unknown locations in landscapes! Or identifying people on portraits.
Thursday, 18 July 2019
Celebrating 50 years living in the prairies

A great little book is now published to commemorate the 40 years that Fritz lived in, and passionately painted the beautiful prairies.
Some of his best prairie pastels and watercolors are part of this collection, published for the 105th birthday of Fritz Stehwien. The book serves well as a portable mini gallery for anyone who loves this land of living skies, and that wow feeling of observing the vast landscapes. Many of these are captured here, in all seasons.
Wednesday, 18 July 2018
On his 104th birthday:
Wednesday, 28 February 2018
10 years later



Not long before that, a German news story on the Nikolaiviertel, reported on the postwar rebuilding of this historic area in the heart of the city of Berlin. A brochure of sketches was briefly shown, that turned out to be the ones done by Fritz when working in nearby Halle, for an architect's firm. Thank you for noticing Thomas!

Amazing family history, and more evidence of the power of the 'paintbrush' as a tool of survival.
Saturday, 20 January 2018
Happy New Year, Happy 2018!
Halle, Saale, Germany, painted in the 1950s |
The very picturesque city of Halle was left behind, as were many friends, belongings and many precious paintings. Some of the works, including the one pictured here, were recovered more than 30 years later. An incredible story and incredible treasures.
Doeffingen in the Swabian Valleys |
50 years ago, a less secretive uprooting was in the works, from the beautiful Swabian valleys across the ocean to Canada, in the fall of 1968. All along, the paintings captured this Stehwien family history and the many stops along the way.
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Saskatoon, Canada, painted in the late 1960s |
Saturday, 7 October 2017
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Town of Battleford Post Office |
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North Battleford Post Office - demolished 1972 |
More research into print and
book publishing has offered
more fascinating historical facts.
In this case, it relates to the watercolor shown early in this blog and below, incorrectly titled 'Watercolor of the neighboring Town of Battleford, Main Street' under the 2011 tab.
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Watercolor by Fritz, 1969 Post Office North Battleford on the former King Street (101st Street) |
Internet research shows that Canada Post had a similar architectural design for its post office buildings throughout Saskatchewan in the early 1900s. Many have since been torn down and others declared heritage sights. The similarities certainly explain the mix-up from the Fritz archives - no notes were kept for most of the works.
Monday, 7 August 2017
50 years ago
The Battlefords River Valley 1967 |
As always, he had his materials with him and came upon overwhelmingly large and infinitely spacious views of the prairies. The skies were alive with clouds and colour as as the peaceful, yet majestic North Saskatchewan River wound its way through the landscape. It was an overpowering feeling for a European citizen (and still is!), and an artist especially.
At the time, population density was likely fewer than 2 people per square kilometer in Saskatchewan, compared to the over 200 in Germany. Those statistics alone made for a good reason to consider immigrating.
Tuesday, 18 July 2017
Celebrating again
The challenge of not just documenting, but also photographing the Stehwien works continues. The larger oil paintings are definitely the most difficult. A large flatbed scanner is looking more and more like one of the better solutions. Very difficult get access to, however, and very costly for a private undertaking.
Wednesday, 10 May 2017
Time flies!
A very disappointing update is the disappearance of the little slideshows on this blog. Without notice the articles and the retrospective booklet that used to run on the lower right-hand side have vanished. Will have to invest some time to find a way to bring them back.
A total of 16 art cards are now published and all have been very well received! Interesting also, is the look of them as an art print in a simple frame.
Thursday, 12 May 2016
Classic Motifs as Art Cards
More details here: http://www.landscapeartpublishing.ca/
Saturday, 26 March 2016
Prairie Spring
Exciting also is the Art Card project, where some of the better motifs are going to press and should be available for purchase soon.
Sunday, 17 January 2016
Vintage: The City of Bridges
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Pastel on print - Broadway bridge with Bessborough Hotel, 1969 |