Betty Davison

Betty Davison (1909–2000) was a Canadian artist.

Born Elizabeth Mary Gertrude Young in Ottawa, Davison studied life drawing and sculpture at the High School of Commerce under Lionel and Ernest Fosbery. She also joined the Ottawa Little Theatre at this time, dancing and acting with the group through the 1930s and 1940s and being frequently photographed by Yousuf Karsh. Her first solo exhibition was in the theater's foyer in 1945. Davison married Richard Lewis in 1939; at his death three years later she became responsible for supporting her family financially, and she took portrait commissions while working as a secretary at the Department of External Affairs. In 1952 she married again, to the architect Arthur Davison, who was also an actor at the Little Theatre. She took art classes at Carleton University and the Ottawa Municipal Art Centre in the 1960s, and credited Alma Duncan with encouraging her to return to her artistic career. Further studies in printmaking with Hilde Schreier during the 1970s led Davison to experiment with the creation of cast paper reliefs, and it is in this medium that she found success. Her 1974 print Paper Roses received $1,000 from the Ontario Arts Council. She received the Martha Jackson Gallery purchase award in 1977; the Harold Pitman prize in 1978; and a purchase award from the Art Gallery of Brant in 1983. Davison died in Ottawa.