Continuing at the National Gallery of Canada (national.gallery.ca) until Jan. 2, Baltic Light: Early Open Air Painting in Denmark and North Germany is the only North American presentation of this luminous exhibition of early 19th-century plein air painting by artists centred in Copenhagen, Hamburg, Berlin and Dresden. Inspired by discoveries in botany, geology and meteorology, and influenced by the longstanding Roman tradition of painting outdoors, these artists left the studio behind in favour of the direct observation of natural phenomena. Despite their fresh approach to composition and their preoccupation with light as a legitimate subject for painting, the reputation of these painters was largely eclipsed by the Impressionists. However, like Impressionism, northern European painting exerted an influence on our own Group of Seven. Returning from an exhibition of Scandinavian art in 1913, J.E.H. MacDonald remarked that the works he had seen "began with nature rather than art," and that "This is what we want to do with Canada." FIGURE