Made in Montreal: Phillips Square, The Art Association of Montreal

Saturday, January 29, 2022

Phillips Square, The Art Association of Montreal

Phillips Square in 1916

Phillips Square, located across the street from The Bay department store in downtown Montreal, has always interested me. Just down the street from Phillips Square was the studio of the Beaver Hall artists, and it was not a long walk from there to the Art Association of Montreal, located on the northeast side of Phillips Square. Eventually, the AAM became the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts / Musée des beaux-arts de Montréal, located on Sherbrooke Street West, and it now has several buildings at that location. The AAM building was opened in 1879; the Museum's "new" building, on Sherbrooke Street, was opened in 1912. I consider the MMFA / MBAM one of the great attractions of the city, one of the great bonuses of living in Montreal, both for tourists and for Montrealers.

The land that became Phillips Square was donated to the city of Montreal in 1842 by the widow of Thomas Phillips, a wealthy Montreal businessman. At that time this was a residential area as it remained for many years. However, over time, businesses began to move to this area and the residents moved out. Today the square is being made more user friendly by the city, trees are being planted and the whole square is being renovated (if that is the right word). Unfortunately, condos are also being built in the area, huge ugly monstrosities that dominate the skyline. The monument in the center of the square is a statue of King Edward VII, the British monarch from 1901 to 1910; Edward was the son of Queen Victoria and, as Prince of Wales, he opened the Victoria Bridge in 1860.

Here are photographs of the Art Association of Montreal, on the northeast corner of the square.