Six galleries each have a signature
This week I am introducing six new and new-to-me galleries that I hope will inspire readers to visit.
Two galleries were included after I served on the jury for a Mtl en Arts street-fair event with gallerists whose judgment I trust: France Cantin of the gallery that bears her name, and Claire Crombez of Galerie C.O.A.
Common themes that emerged from my visits included collaboration with other galleries and efforts to reach an international public.
Christine Redfern founded her gallery in the Quartier des spectacles because it fit with her vision of tapping into Montreal’s strengths in the fields of technology and performance — for example, such dynamic organizations as the Society for Arts and Technology and the Cirque du Soleil.
ELLEPHANT showcases artists doing work in new media that is socially engaged and involves a strong performance angle, Redfern said in an interview.
And she collaborates with other organizations. In the year it’s been open, ELLEPHANT has held exhibitions as part of Vues d’Afrique, Art souterrain and the Digital Art Biennial (BIAN).
Gallery artists include such established artists as Skawennati, whose Time Traveler videos were a hit at the 2014 Montreal Biennial, and Jean-Pierre Gauthier, whose kinetic installation Orchestre à géométrie variable is on display at the Musée d’art contemporain. Those artists, along with Eliza Griffiths, Karen Elaine Spencer, Sabrina Ratté and Catherine Béchard, will show work this fall.
“I represent the best aboriginal, Canadian and Quebec artists whose work I feel will grow in value over time,” Redfern said. “All are established artists in mid-career with 15 to 25 years experience.”
Despite the “elle” in ELLEPHANT, the gallery is not a showcase for female artists, Redfern said. And it’s not about her. “It’s about something bigger. And you can’t think of an elephant without thinking big.”
ELLEPHANT, 1201 St-Dominique St.; ellephant.org.
Marie-Josée Rousseau bills La Castiglione galerie d’art photo as the only gallery in Montreal that shows nothing but still photography.
Rousseau opened her gallery on St-Laurent Blvd. two years ago, but moved to the Belgo Building in May after a truck crashed into her gallery and repairs dragged on.
“I get two to three submissions per day, but the ones I choose are artists who use photography to go deeper and deeper into their subject,” Rousseau said in an interview.
An artist like Normand Rajotte — who has shown in Europe and at the Mois de la Photo — and who will have an exhibition in the new season. His images are precise “but meditative about the ‘small life’ of the forest,” she said.
Rousseau studied the history of art photography and was fascinated with the story of Virginia Oldoini (1837-1899), Countess of Castiglione and mistress of Napoleon III.
La Castiglione, as she was known, was a significant early photographer. She also thought she was the most beautiful woman in the world, Rousseau said.
La Castiglione made costumes for more than 400 “selfies” in the fantasy settings she designed.
La Castiglione galerie d’art photo, 372 Ste-Catherine St. W., Suite 416; lacastiglione.ca.
People stopped at a red light at St-Laurent Blvd. and Beaubien St. might notice the art in a window of Galerie C.O.A.
But C.O.A. and the other two street-art galleries discussed in this column don’t depend on walk-in sales. Eighty-five per cent of Galerie C.O.A.’s sales are to buyers outside Canada, gallery owner Jean-Pascal Fournier said.
“People buy from seeing an image on their phones,” he said.
Fournier described his taste as “urban art with a fine-arts esthetic,” and some of the artists featured in the group exhibition I saw will be back for solo shows.
Sandra Chevrier is the gallery star. Fournier was selling her work online before he opened the gallery in 2014.
Chevrier does realistic portraits of women breaking through masks that depict comic-book superheroes. She appropriates male iconography and applies it to women who are trying to survive as a good mother, a seductive lady and a career woman, Fournier said.
“Her work sells around the world within 24 hours of being posted,” he said.
Galerie C.O.A., 6405 St-Laurent Blvd.; galeriecoa.com.
Galerie Matthew Namour operates like Galerie C.O.A.: both show international artists in Montreal, and Canadian artists in New York and elsewhere through connections made with gallery owners at art fairs.
“You can’t walk one street in New York and not see a mural by one of our artists,” said gallery manager Alexis Hranchuk.
Gallery owner Namour also runs Images Boréales Galerie d’Art Inuit (imagesboreales.com) in the same building at the corner of St-Paul St. and St-Laurent Blvd.
“I grew up surrounded by the Inuit art that my parents sold and got interested in native arts around the world,” Namour said. “There’s soul in that art” that he said he sees both in aboriginal art worldwide and in the street art he came to love.
“These artists come from outside the sociological elite, and they put it out on the street,” he said.
Galerie Matthew Namour opened in June, taking over Galerie Yves Laroche’s roster of street artists. The Laroche gallery continues to operate at 6355 StLaurent Blvd. (yveslaroche.com).
Galerie Matthew Namour, 217 St-Laurent Blvd.; matthewnamour.com.
Galerie France Cantin exists within a dental clinic in the Gay Village called Galerie Dentaire. The clinic is on the second floor, but its reception desk is on the main floor, where Cantin and her partner, Frédéric Huard, show art that is often baroque in its extravagant detail.
The gallery opened in June in a space that has long been used to display art. Cantin had organized a number of exhibitions in the space, including for Artsida, which assists people living with HIV and AIDS.
Cantin describes herself as an agent for artists, rather than a representative. She helps artists apply for grants, develop portfolios and study proposed contracts. “I give help as needed and teach them to do the rest,” she said in an interview.
“I was an artist,” she added. “I can put myself in an artist’s shoes.”
Cantin says she shows the art of people who haven’t had solo exhibitions and better-known artists who want to do experimental work their galleries don’t want to show.
Hélène Coulombe and Monique Danis are having their first solo exhibitions in Montreal. Zilon, a well-known street painter, will have an exhibition of his drawings this fall, while Dominique Desbiens, a portraitist, will show abstract work in November.
Hélène Coulombe and Monique Danis: Influence continues to Sept. 11 at Galerie France Cantin, 1200 Amherst St.; facebook.com/ galeriedentaire.
Located near the Rosemont métro, Galerie Le repaire des 100 talents gives many artists a chance to show their work in thematic exhibitions of more than 100 works hung salon-style in its storefront space. A few works sport gallery frames, but most of the art is unframed.
Gallery owners Luc Poudrier and Adeline Lamarre offer artists a chance to be seen at a cost of $25 to $60. The current exhibition, I’m Mad as Hell, is full of diamonds in the rough, making political statements as conceptually strong as anything in the museums and galleries of contemporary art.
But less subtle. “We reject artists whose work has to be explained,” Poudrier said in an interview.
Poudrier made props and did special-effects makeup for the film industry, but didn’t like suppressing his creativity to make things to order.
Now he creates fake consumer goods like the two bags of toy soldiers in the current exhibition: Bush’s New World Order and Obama’s World Peace. Obama’s bag has more soldiers than Bush’s.
“It’s dark humour, but I’m sincere,” he said.
Witches is the theme for October.
I’m Mad as Hell continues to Sept. 18 at Galerie Le repaire des 100 talents, 5867 St-Hubert St.; 100talents.blogspot.ca.
Aug. 27 and 28, 1 to 4 p.m.: Serenity is the theme of the 15th annual juried art exhibition organized by the Friends of the Mount Royal Cemetery and shown at the cemetery complex at 1297 de la Forêt Rd.
There are 30 artists showing work, with musical accompaniment on Aug. 27 by the Marcel Anicic Guitar Duo and on Aug. 28 by harpist Myriam Reid. Heritage Montreal will lead walks through the cemetery at 1 p.m. both days. The Sunday walk is in English.
For more information, email Andrew Sarrasin at aws@mountroyalcem.com.
Aug. 31: The Montreal edition of the annual professional photography competition World Press Photo opens at Bonsecours Market.
On display are 150 images from the 98,000 submitted by 5,800 photographers around the world. They include photographs of the Paris attacks, the Nepal earthquake and the Middle East refugee crisis.
There are four complementary exhibitions, including one by Guillaume Simoneau about newly arrived Syrian immigrants in Montreal. Oxfam-Quebec shows photographs relating to tax havens and their effect on the world economy.
World Press Photo continues to Oct. 2 at Bonsecours Market, 325 de la Commune St. E.; worldpressphotomontreal.ca.
The Women’s Art Studio of Montreal is looking for new members. (Men are welcome.) Members meet Wednesday mornings in N.D.G. to work on their individual projects in a variety of media. Professional artists give occasional workshops.
For more information, contact Liliane Goldman at lilygoldman@gmail.com or visit womensartstudiomontreal.blogspot.com.