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Et
Savoie l’artiste prend des chances…
Pendant plus de vingt ans, son travail de pastelliste a fait de lui
l’un des artistes figuratifs les plus respectés et réputés au
Canada. D’autres artistes auraient profité de cette notoriété et se
seraient assis confortablement sur une carrière sans histoires et en
auraient récolté les fruits. Pas notre homme…
Il
y a maintenant quelques années, Savoie décide de prendre un risque
énorme et met de côté ses pastels, son papier et le confort d’une
technique acquise et affutée par les années. Il troque le succès
assuré pour le bonheur de se ressourcer comme artiste et se met à la
peinture à l’huile.
Tout artiste ayant fait le saut d’un médium à un autre connaît bien
les pressions et le travail qu’impliquent un tel changement.
Imaginez maintenant le stress qu’une telle décision place sur un
artiste établi.
Et
pourtant… À peine cet exode picturale entamé, Savoie démontre une
affinité pour ce nouveau médium que nul n’aurait pu anticiper.
Les
heureux qui ont jeté les premier regards aux nouvelles oeuvres de
l’artiste sont sidérés. Tant Savoie était un pastelliste accompli,
son travail de peintre pousse tellement loin les limites de son
talent qu’il apparaît à tous qu’un nouvel artiste est né!
En
effet, les nouvelles oeuvres de Savoie explosent! Lumière,
composition, thèmes, tout vibre et vit d’une énergie toute aussi
inattendue que bienvenue. Il comprend instinctivement les
propriétés de son nouveau médium et en exploite toutes les
facettes. Brillance, texture, profondeur et richesse, il prend ses
décennies d’expérience de pastelliste et profite de son nouveau
cheval de bataille pour en extirper des émotions que l’on n’aurait
cru possibles.
Sa
neige est plus blanche, plus lumineuse, ses pierres sont plus dures,
plus vraies, ses ciels sont vivants! Et tant ses rues que ses
forêts sont la vie même des tableaux qu’il exécute avec un plaisir
et un bonheur évident et qui lui garde l’énergie vitale essentielle
aux grands artistes.
Où
ira le travail de ce peintre exceptionnel dans cinq, dix ans? Qui
oserait même s’avancer à ce sujet? Qui aurait pû prévoir il y a à
peine cinq ans qu’il deviendrait l’un des maîtres de la peinture à
l’huile de notre époque?
Prenons exemple sur Richard lui-même et laissons le temps et la vie
nous dévoiler les surprises que cet artiste exceptionnel nous
réserve.
S.M.Pearson
Mai
2012
Even
in the darkest of the nights of Richard Savoie’s paintings, light
seems to explode in a forward motion while the people who live in
the paintings appear to turn their back on us as if we were catching
a mere glimpse of a fleeting moment.
As in
a snapshot, it looks like the artist’s visual memory allows him to
take just a thin slice of life, a momentary second; a feeling. For
most of us, that instant would be too brief to express with words,
let alone pictures. Savoie, however, is able to take us to a place;
a moment; to let us feel what he felt and has translated onto the
canvas.
Born
in 1959 in Moncton, Richard Savoie is a man who likes to live on the
edge. The man likes to push his physical limits and to put his mind
to the test. An inveterate cyclist, he spends a great part of the
year on two wheels and uses the energy thus gathered within to
infuse his art with an ever renewed energy.
And
the artist also likes to take risks….
For
over twenty years as a pastel artist, Savoie was one of Canada’s
most respected figurative artists. Many an artist would have take
advantage of this situation and coasted through a comfortable
career. Not our man….
A few
years back, Savoie takes a chance and puts away his pastels and
paper and puts aside a technique that had become second nature
through the years. He trades guaranteed success for a new
challenge: oil painting.
Any
artist who ever decided to foray into a new medium knows the
pressure and the work that such an endeavour entails. Imagine the
weight it puts on the shoulders of such an established artist.
And
yet, no sooner had the artist started to explore this new medium
that he was showing extreme affinity to it, far above what anyone
might have expected.
The
happy few who got a glimpse at the first of the new works are
flabbergasted. As much as Savoie, the pastel artist was
fascinating, his work as a painter in oils pushes the boundaries of
his talent so far that it seems as if a new artist is born!
Savoie’s new work explodes! Light, composition, themes; all glow
and shine of a life as unexpected as it is welcome. Instinctively,
he understands the properties of the new medium and is able to use
all of its intricacies. Brilliance, texture, depth and richness, he
uses decades of experience as a pastel artist and infuses his work
with emotions one might have thought impossible.
His
snow is whiter, lighter, his stones harder, more real, his skies are
alive! And the streets and the forests he paints are the life
itself of the paintings that he obviously creates with a happiness
and a joy that bring him the life force that makes for great
artists.
Where
will this magnificent artist’s work stand in five, ten years? Who
would even dare to take a guess? Who, five years ago, would have
guessed that he would become one of today’s masters of oil painting?
Let’s
take a page from Richard’s book and let time and life show us all
the surprises that this exceptional artist has in store.
S.M.Pearson
May
2012
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