Eclipse Art Gallery is proud to present "Outside Looking In with Mendelson Joe" featuring the vivid artworks from late Canadian Musician, Writer & Artist; Mendelson Joe.

Joe taught himself to play his sister’s Gibson guitar at age eleven.  His musical idols were Little Richard, Jimmy Reed, Ray Charles, and Jerry Lee Lewis. In 1964, at age nineteen, Joe Mendelson became a professional singer-songwriter-musician.  His debut was at The Depression coffee-house in Calgary, Alberta, Canada.  Four years later, he formed a bluesy rock band with Toronto guitarist Michael McKenna.  They made five albums under the banner Mainline.  

Lyrics, letters, postcards, prose, fiction, and autobiographical stories were all part of Mendelson Joe’s written work. 

Every day began with the writing of letters for Mr. Joe. Mendelson Joe was not a social person and preferred to speak to people one-to-one instead of in groups or at dinner parties. Joe was not one for small talk and firmly believed in the inverse relationship between the quality of a conversation and the number of people involved. However, Joe was a keen and engaged citizen of the world and a firm believer in the power of the written letter. The letters took the form of letters-to-the-editor as well as unsolicited letters of encouragement, condemnation, compliments and criticism to various members of the media and politicians and entertainers who had come to Joe’s attention through various news media. Joe also communicated extensively with his friends and colleagues through letter-writing. 

1975 marked the beginning of Joe’s career as a painter.  Joe’s unstoppable creative nature sought an alternative outlet from music as he became disenchanted with the business aspect of the music business (as always – ahead of his time). Joe recounted that he got his start painting when he found some paints in the garbage and thought he would give it a try. 

Mendelson Joe painted each and every day until Parkinson’s Disease took away that facility in 2022. Along with making music, painting was Joe’s way of understanding the world and coping and celebrating human life and nature. Joe’s subjects include landscapes, portraits, and political and social commentary. Joe’s paintings are vivid, colourful, sometimes playful, sometimes scathing representations of the world according to Joe. Joe’s bold colour palette was much like the man himself – larger than life in impact. Unforgettable.