Levine Thorfin Flexhaug was born on the family farm outside of Climax, Saskatchewan in 1918 to parents, Eddie and Emily Flexhaug. In the early 1920s the family moves to town, where Eddie is employed driving mail and freight trucks and Emily earns extra cash as a midwife.

Levine takes an early interest in art and by age 8 it’s noticed by locals that he has some degree of talent, so a local homemakers group gifts him a box of paints. He begins painting scenes on chunks of cardboard and starts selling them for ten cents each.

After his mother’s death in 1932, the family moves to Pierceland, and then to Lloydminster where Levine spends his time as a farmhand. By 1936, Levine decides to head back to Climax and makes the over 500 km journey from Lloydminster in the winter by dogsled.

By 1937, Levine’s art career starts taking off, he paints his first commissioned artworks, which are a series of six large murals and two smaller ones inside John Gryde’s General store in Climax. He then sets up an easel outside the store on Saturdays and sells paintings to the locals when they come to town to socialize and shop. As his name grows, he is also commissioned to paint murals in the Silver Dollar pool hall and a café in nearby Bracken. In 1938 he moves to Tilley Alberta for a short time where he paints murals in the Chinese café, hotel, and other buildings in town, before heading to Kyle to paint murals on three of the four walls of the beer parlour.

In 1942, “Flexie” joins the army as a cook and is stationed in England where he continues to paint in his off hours, including Canadian landscapes in “The Plough” a pub in nearby Surrey, and in the army mess where he works. He is later discharged in 1944 for health reasons and returns to Canada.

Levine never stayed in one place too long, living in various towns around Alberta like Claresholm, and Edmonton, and in Saskatchewan in Gull Lake, Lumsden, and various places in between during the “off season”, but would often set up shop during the summer months in resort areas, like Jasper, Loon Lake, Waskesiu, and Waterton, to sell his art to tourists, sometimes living in his car.

In the 1940s Levine starts coming to Piapot and sells paintings at the Java Shop, and when it burns down, his base of operation moves to the Wheel Inn outside of town on the newly opened section of the Trans-Canada highway, where he speed paints scenes for travelers on their way through, and a mural in the café section of the business for owner Johnny Gold. The mural is a scene of the Gold Brothers ranch north of Piapot, which includes a windmill, horses, cowboys working calves, and as a nod to area ranches, numerous local brands were painted on the full chute. He also painted a Christmas mural on sheets of plywood that would cover the original mural during the holiday season.

Levine continues painting murals in addition to his summer works, and they appear in numerous locations including the Alberta Hotel in Edmonton, the Eaton’s store in Winnipeg, the Co-Op Home Centre and R.H. Phillips & Co. clothiers in Lloydminster, The Rock Creek Hotel in B.C., in the home of Robert Balfour south of Climax, a scene of cowboys rounding up cattle in the Consul Hotel, and many others.

By 1967 Levine was looking for a change of pace and decides to open a trail riding business in Fairmont Hot Springs with saddles purchased from Bowie’s Store in Piapot. During the next four years, Flexie paints very little and only during the winter months. His style also changes from his very familiar mountain scenes shown in so many of his works on display here, to one that emulates a Charlie Russell style of Western scenes.  

In 1972, Levine is diagnosed with congestive heart failure and closes his riding academy, but continues as a janitor at the Fairmont Lodge, until his passing in 1974 at the age of 56 and becomes the first person interred in the cemetery at Fairmont Hot Springs.

Levine Flexhaug was a jack of all trades, earning money as a farm hand, cartoonist, cook, art teacher, gas jockey, sawyer, and trail boss, but his true talent was as an artist. His works hang in the homes of locals who knew him, collectors, art lovers, and museums and galleries. He is remembered fondly as “that speed painter” who would paint a mountain framed by trees, with a lake and a deer or moose or cabin in the foreground while he visited with you or as your car was filled with gas.

To learn more about Levine Flexhaug, there is a book about his life and works titled “A Sublime Vernacular” By Nancy Tousley and Peter White published by the Art Gallery of Grande Prairie, and a documentary titled “Flexie! All the Same and All Different” directed by Gary Burns.