Albert Edouard Cloutier (1902-1965) was a commercial artist before and after the Second World War. Much of his work was done in mural form for hotels and restaurants. In 1941 he became associated with the federal government, notably as a designer of war posters. In March 1944 he was commissioned as an official war artist with the Royal Canadian Air Force, serving in that capacity until his demobilization in August 1946.
The greatest part of his wartime painting was done with Eastern Air Command, the formation that kept watch over North Atlantic aerial traffic and waged war upon German submarines operating in the northwestern Atlantic. On 17 April, 1945 he arrived at No. 37 Radio Unit (actually a radar post) at Brig Harbour, off the Labrador coast. The spring break-up occurred soon afterwards, making it impossible for ski- or float-equipped aircraft to alight. It was not until 22 June that an airplane was able to land with mail and take Cloutier back to Goose Bay. In those two months, however, he had an opportunity to observe men at work in an isolated environment, in a climate so harsh that the diarist of No. 37 Radio Unit once described it as a "northern Alcatraz."
The watercolour Radar Post (26.3 x 30.2 cm) is an attempt to portray in symbolic form the equipment, geography, and working conditions at Brig Harbour, itself typical of many remote radar sites in Canada. Overhead are some of the aircraft passing through the region and being monitored by the great, square antenna. In the hut a man plots the course of the airplanes. The central figure in the foreground seems, at first glance, to be wearing glasses; in fact, they represent radar scopes. All of this is set in the rugged, rocky coast of Labrador with icebergs passing offshore.
Courtesy: Canadian War Museum National Museum of Man, National Museums of Canada (11018)
