Banting — a Nobel artist

Frederick Grant Banting (1891–1941), the Canadian Nobel laureate responsible for discovering insulin, had a less familiar side. As an artist he exhibited under the name Frederick Grant.1,2

Having enjoyed art at school,3 he took up painting again in 1920, as a relaxing way to fill in time between patients in his struggling medical practice in London, Ontario. He later wrote: “My happiest hours of this period were spent thus trying to copy pictures mostly from old magazines or books.”1 In the long gaps between patients, he also read the medical literature, which gave him the idea for his research. Within 3 years, he had isolated insulin and received the Nobel Prize.2

Throughout his life, art continued to be his favourite form of relaxation. As his confidence and skill as an artist grew, he began to paint the Canadian landscape. In the late 1920s, Banting’s introduction to the Canadian artists known as the Group of Seven provided him with encouragement that had a lasting influence on his work, and forged lifelong friendships for this enthusiastic amateur.

Banting was intending to retire from medical research at 50 to paint full time, but his plans were foiled by his accidental death, at 49.

(Paintings reproduced with permission from the Estate of Nelson Banting, Alliston, Ontario).