André Ménard
THE POWER BEHIND THE SCENES: CULTURE MONTREAL is an ongoing portrait project depicting the faces of designers, impresarios and artistic directors, visionaries shaping Montreal’s cultural landscape.
Over six-foot in height, my paintings reflect and capture the larger-than-life qualities of these individuals.
Using small black and white photographs I took during meetings with the subjects as a point a departure, I begin to apply loosely laid expressionist strokes in oil onto a large-scale birch substrate. Layering them one over the other results in vibrant abstracted photographic likeness, while also creating a transparency that invites the viewer into the portrait before them.
Transparent and true to life. Me, my work and my process. Attentive and authentic.
I have a genuine curiosity about who these people are and what drives them. These visionaries are a part of the foundation of Montreal’s unique cultural milieu and through my image-making art practice, I feel I too, contribute to Montreal’s ever-evolving cultural landscape.
Technical details: Each oil painting is created on a wooden substrate of birch wood, 6 feet by 7 feet. All panels are the same size.
THE POWER BEHIND THE SCENES: MONTREAL CULTURE is an ongoing portrait project featuring visionaries who shape Montreal’s cultural landscape, including fashion designers, impresarios, and art directors. Measuring over six feet, my paintings reflect and evoke the larger-than-life qualities of their subjects. Working from black and white photographs I take of my subjects, I closely observe the minute grains in the image. Then, using paint sticks on a white surface, I apply broad, loose, and expressionistic layers. I respond to the microscopic details of each subject, and it is from this process of deep observation that color, form, and texture begin to emerge. This search for something more, this fundamentally optimistic study, is translated into a vast, multi-layered close-up whose luminous transparency and tight framing evoke a world beyond the immediate. As I tap into this rich vein of attention to detail, the hills and valleys of their faces reveal the places of their being, creating a luminous bridge between the external surface and the internal world, between portrait and landscape.
THE POWER BEHIND THE SCENES: MONTREAL CULTURE is an ongoing portrait project featuring visionaries who shape Montreal’s cultural landscape, including fashion designers, impresarios, and art directors. Measuring over six feet, my paintings reflect and evoke the larger-than-life qualities of their subjects. Working from black and white photographs I take of my subjects, I closely observe the minute grains in the image. Then, using paint sticks on a white surface, I apply broad, loose, and expressionistic layers. I respond to the microscopic details of each subject, and it is from this process of deep observation that color, form, and texture begin to emerge. This search for something more, this fundamentally optimistic study, is translated into a vast, multi-layered close-up whose luminous transparency and tight framing evoke a world beyond the immediate. As I tap into this rich vein of attention to detail, the hills and valleys of their faces reveal the places of their being, creating a luminous bridge between the external surface and the internal world, between portrait and landscape.
