MONUMENTAL MURAL DEDICATION IN DOWNTOWN MONTREAL MAGNETIC ART : BY MARC SÉGUIN IN TRIBUTE TO JEAN PAUL RIOPELLE
As part as MU's mural collection of Montreal Trailblazers Artists
MONTREAL, Oct. 5, 2022 /CNW Telbec/ - Kicking off Jean Paul Riopelle's centenary celebrations, the Riopelle Foundation, in collaboration with MU, the City of Montreal, Tourisme Montréal and the Plateau-Mont-Royal borough, inaugurated Magnetic Art, a monumental mural in tribute to the iconic and world-renowned Montreal artist. Created by Marc Séguin, the mural launches Riopelle's 100th anniversary festivities, which will continue throughout the year. It is also a great milestone for MU, the charitable non-profit behind the mural, celebrating its 15th anniversary in style ! Art magnétique is the 25th mural of MU's prestigious Montreal's Great Artists series, launched in 2010 to honour the city's cultural and artistic icons. It is also MU's 200th exterior mural, turning Montreal into a giant open-air museum.
With a surface of more than 160 feet high/48 meters high (9,000 square feet/836 square meters), the mural can be admired from multiple points of view in Downtown Montreal, from McGill University's campus to Mount Royal's mythic Kondiaronk lookout, which also offers a spectacular view of Tower of Songs, the iconic mural in tribute to Leonard Cohen, located on the opposite side of downtown. This mural will surely become a new symbol of the artist's native city.
The mural lives up to Riopelle's incredible legacy by inviting viewers to connect with his work and sources of inspiration : nature and landscapes, his bestiary, his passion and creative freedom.
During the inauguration, the mural was illuminated thanks to Tourisme Montreal and McGill University's collaboration. Montreal Mayor Valérie Plante, artists, partners and many dignitaries were present for the unveiling.
« The mural's unveiling kicks off the centenary celebrations of one of Canada's most remarkable artists. It is the first of the Riopelle Foundation's many legacy projects to be realized this year for the public on Montreal, Quebec and the world. These projects bring together a host of renowned partners, will spread over the next five seasons. And what a better way to start the festivities than with a mural located in the Plateau Mont-Royal, the artist's native neighbourghood and created by none other than Marc Séguin. We are thrilled to see Riopelle honoured alongside other great Montreal cultural icons such as Leonard Cohen, Alanis Obomsawin, Paul-Émile Borduas, Marcelle Ferron, Daisy Peteron-Sweeney, Phyllis Lambert and Oliver Jones. The Foundation warmly thanks all of its many precious partners that made this legacy possible, a legacy that will be iconic in Montreal for generations to come.» - Manon Gauthier, Executive Director of the Riopelle Foundation and General Commissioner of the artist's centenary celebrations.
«The City of Montreal is proud to unveil this magnificent mural, in Riopelle's birth city and for his 100th anniversary, to celebrate the artist's vast heritage. I wish to thank the artist Marc Séguin and MU's team for this work of art that highlights Riopelle's humanistic approach and his love of nature. Montrealers will be able to discover and admire this mural for years to come. I'm truly moved to welcome this new work of art in Montreal. » Valérie Plante, Montreal Mayor
«Jean Paul Riopelle is one of Canada's most remarkable artists of the 20th century. It was quite natural to offer him a place of choice in our city's landscape, as he himself has participated so much in creating it with his sculptures and other works of art. Thousands of visitors will gather to admire this monumental mural created in his memory! It represents our continued desire to beautify our city through public art». Yves Lalumière, President and Executive Director of Tourisme Montréal
"Since our humble beginning 15 years ago, MU's most cherished values have always been to inspire, to share and to bequeath: to share values, knowledge and appreciation for public art, but also to transmit to new generations teachings of the past, that of the great, that of the artists who have shaped the world, who have innovated and who have marked our collective identity as Montrealers. The mural in homage to Riopelle, a trailblazer, embodies all of this. Marc Séguin, a student who in turn became a master, now an apprentice muralist with this new generation of young artists from MU, offered Montreal a legacy to Riopelle, with a unique, original and resolutely contemporary work. By honouring art through art, this collection of murals reminds us of this duty of meaning and memory to be protected, while anchoring itself in current artistic practices. I would like to thank Yseult Riopelle for this direction that Jean Paul Riopelle would have liked, to make this legacy a project of creation and innovation for younger artists, thus paying him full homage! "Enthuses Elizabeth-Ann Doyle, Executive and Artistic Director of MU.
Marc Séguin is a multidisciplinary artist from Quebec. The Montreal Musem of Contemporary Arts, the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts and the Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec have all acquired major works by him. Riopelle has been one of his idols for over 30 years. He has studied Riopelle throughout his academic and artistic career.
Marc Séguin was chosen through a public call to artists. Twenty artists submitted a proposal and four finalists were selected by a jury presided by Yseult Riopelle, the artist's daughter, author of the Catalogue raisonné de Jean Paul Riopelle and honorary commissioner of the centenary celebrations, representatives of the Jean Paul Riopelle Foundation, a visual artist, a gallery owner, the chief curator of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts and representatives of the wall's owner.
World-renowned Canadian painter, engraver and sculptor Jean Paul Riopelle was born in Montreal on October 7, 1923 and died on March 12, 2002. From his native Montreal to his more than 40 years in France, his expeditions and adventures that brought him to the very limits of our world, and his return to Quebec during the last decades of his life, Riopelle's artistic and cultural legacy extends to the four corners of the globe. Through the admiration that scores of collectors and museums have for his oeuvre, and the archives and treasures that he created throughout his life, his influence on the history of art is unequivocal. Along with other key members of Les Automatistes movement, Riopelle co-signed in 1948 the Refus Global manifesto that deeply marked Quebec society in the mid-20th century, and his impact is still today felt far beyond the boundaries of art.
Never-Before-Seen Celebrations for a Canadian Artist
Orchestrated by the Jean Paul Riopelle Foundation, the festivities surrounding Riopelle's 100th anniversary in 2023 will offer the general public a unique opportunity to (re)discover this Montreal-born artist who has marked the history of art. Featuring a wide variety of artistic disciplines, from classical music to circus, theater, literature, as well as with the participation of museum and educational institutions, the official program of the Centenary Celebrations will give rise to a multitude of cultural projects in Canada and around the world. Starting in the fall of 2022 under the theme "One with Nature", a host of prestigious partners will contribute to making these celebrations – the most important ever planned for a Canadian visual artist – a resounding success, promoting Canadian talent and inspiring new generations of artists through Riopelle's impressive legacy.
Discover the Centenary Celebrations' official program on : https://fondationriopelle.com/en/2023-the-centenary/
About the Riopelle Foundation
Imagined in the 1960s and founded in 2019 by a group of Canadian philanthropists, the Riopelle Foundation celebrates the life, work and legacy of the artist through the preservation, promotion and dissemination of his work. The Foundation seeks, through innovation, creative programs, arts education, partnerships and support, to inspire future generations of artists and audiences so they can achieve their full creative potential and broaden their appreciation of Jean Paul Riopelle in the history of Canadian and international art. The year 2023 will mark the artist's centennial, with over a year of festivities in the form of multiple exhibits, cultural events and educational and commemorative activities throughout Canada and abroad.
Facebook: facebook.com/FondationRiopelle | Twitter: @FdnJPRiopelle
Instagram: @fdnriopelle | LinkedIn: linkedin.com/company/fondationriopelle
About MU
MU is a charity that transforms Montreal's public space by creating murals anchored in local communities. The heart of his approach: creating murals of high artistic quality to see and experience art on a daily basis, to trigger social transformation and to bequeath an open-air museum to Montreal. Since 2007, MU has produced more than 150 large-scale and long-lasting murals throughout Montreal, in addition to implementing an important educational component. The democratization of art is at the heart of its mandate. Celebrating its 15th anniversary, MU has created more than 175 large-scale and long-lasting murals throughout Montreal, and more than 350 murals in schools through its educational activities. In addition to supporting artists through its fair fee policy ($ 2.5 million awarded in artistic fees over 15 years) and offering them a public showcase, MU helps to stimulate reflection on the impact of visual arts on citizens by integrating them into its development approach. This approach combines the creation of visual works in public space with a requalification and creation of common sense.
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SOURCE MU
City of Montreal, Camille Bégin, Media relations - City of Montreal, [email protected]; Riopelle Foundation, Raphaël Melançon, Trafalgar Stratégies, 514 765-7879, 514 444-6968, [email protected]; MU, Julie Carlier, MU, Office: 514 509 6877, Cell: 438-630-2123, Email: [email protected]; For photos of the mural : Olivier Bousquet
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