The Painting Projet. A Snapshot of Painting in Canada

Following the spectacular success of the exhibition The Painting Project: A Snapshot of Painting in Canada, the Galerie de l’UQAM launched a Web version. Realised in partnership with the Virtual Museum of Canada, an initiative of the Department of Canadian Heritage and in collaboration with UQAM’s Audiovisual and Multimedia Production Service, the exhibition will be available online for 5 years, providing access to the results of extensive research and offering the public a picture of the current state of painting in Canada.

The Painting Project. A Snapshot of Painting in Canada

Unique for the diversity of recent works on display, the exhibition testifies to the intense activity taking place in painters’ studios all across Canada. The Painting Project proposes to delineate the practice of recent painting in Canada for a wide audience, based on exhaustive research in a didactic register and with a selection of 60 works by as many artists.

The ambition is to provide a broader view of painting by founding a “panorama in the making”, according to a survey of the categories observable today. Four became the basis for selections: the “figure of reality,” emanating from the procedures of figuration, in line with the great painting traditions; “fictional worlds,” arising from figurative undertakings with content that is either symbolic—inspired by cartoons, comic strips, graphic novels, the media or commercial illustration; “painting as the subject,” where, by means of quotation, gesture and abstraction, “how to paint” becomes the subject matter; and, finally, “hybrid practices,” in which painting develops in osmosis with other art disciplines to produce object-paintings, writing-paintings and photograph-paintings.

Teaching Tools

In addition to the exhibition, the site will offer visitors educational materials, including a glossary, a timeline with historical landmarks illustrating the evolution of painting in Canada, a bibliography, knowledge-testing games, and short videos of artists at work.

Virtual Museum of Canada

The Virtual Museum of Canada (VMC), managed by the Canadian Heritage Information Network (CHIN), is an initiative that enables the creation of Canadian digital heritage content, ensures its availability, and encourages access to this content by Canadian and international audiences. It is a major online initiative that presents Canada’s history, heritage and culture to domestic and international audiences through online exhibits and other digital resources. The VMC portal features content produced by CHIN’s more than 1,600 museum partners. The Government of Canada has provided $193,905 in funding through its VMC Investment Program, covering 40% of the total budget.

virtualmuseum.ca

Production

Research and Content

Direction: Louise Déry
Curated by: Julie Bélisle
Coordination: Julie Bélisle
Research: Marie-Eve Beaupré, Julie Bélisle
Texts: Marie-Eve Beaupré, Julie Bélisle
Research assistance: Gina Cortopassi, Maxime Moinet, Anne Philippon, Valérie Pineau
Biobibliographies: Pascale Tremblay
Education content: Ève Dorais
Image calibration: Louis-Philippe Côté
Filming and editing of the videos: Frédéric Lavoie
French editing: Magalie Bouthillier
English editing: Donald Pistolesi
French translation: Frank Norbert
English translation: Marcia Couëlle
Proofreading: Julie Bélisle, Ève Dorais, Philippe Dumaine, Yvon Gagnon, Audrey Genois

Website Design and Development

Audiovisual and Multimedia Production Services, UQAM
Project manager: Pierre-Gilles Lavallée
Design: Jean-Michel Pépin
Web development: Yadisleyvi Capote Chavez, Aude Crispel, Alex Grenier, Jean-Pierre Roy

The committees

Scientific Committee

Michel Boulanger, artist and professor, École des arts visuels et médiatiques, UQAM, Montreal
Geneviève Goyer-Ouimette, freelance curator, Montreal
David Liss, artistic director, Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art, Toronto
Nicolas Mavrikakis, art critic and professor in art history, Montréal
Jonathan Shaughnessy, assistant curator, National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa

Advisor Committee

Wayne Baerwaldt, director/curator, Alberta College of Art + Design, Calgary
Ray Cronin, director, Art Gallery of Nova Scotia, Halifax
Jeff Nye, program coordinator, Last Mountain Lake Cultural Centre, Regina
Ann Webb, executive-director, Canadian Art Foundation, Toronto
Pan Wendt, curator, Confederation Centre Art Gallery, Charlottetown