Donald Bittorf

As explained by Trevor Boddy in Modern Architecture in Alberta, Donald Bittorf is one of Alberta’s “consistently good architects.” One of Bittorf’s most memorable projects was the Edmonton Art Gallery, now named the Art Gallery of Alberta. The Gallery, initially called the Edmonton Museum of the Arts, was established in 1924 and its collection was housed in various and oft-changing locations. In 1952, the Museum of the Arts was given a semi-permanent residence at Richard Secord House. Four years later it was renamed the Edmonton Art Gallery, and in 1962 – thanks to a generous donation from Mrs. A.E. Condell – Bittorf and B. James Wensely were commissioned to design a new building.

The Gallery was opened in 1969 and it featured a brutalist architectural style popular in Alberta throughout the 1960s and 1970s. A part of the modernist architectural movement, brutalist features range from block-like geometric forms to organic and sculptural looking structures. Such buildings are made of poured concrete to reveal the unique textures of the wooden forms used to hold the concrete until it hardens. Other materials used in brutalist designs include brick, glass, steel, rough-hewn stone, and gabion. While the design exemplifies the modernist era of architecture, at the time many people did not embrace this unique style and lobbied for a new building. The art gallery will undergo a massive facelift in the following years.

Bittorf was no stranger to designing spaces for art, as in the late 1970s he designed the Principal Plaza in downtown Edmonton. Boddy explains that the Plaza is a fine example of late modernist work that is both elegant and distinguished.

Trevor Boddy, Modern Architecture in Alberta (Regina: University of Regina and Canadian Plains Research Centre, 1987), 116.