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Paul Fournier
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Title: Emergence in Dark Blue, 2006
Artist: Paul Fournier (Canadian b. 1939)
Medium: Acrylic on Canvas
Dimensions: 20 x 24"
Photographer: Gokche Erkan
Image Courtesy: The Moore Gallery
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Paul Fournier is among the finest contemporary Canadian artists. Of his latest show at Toronto's Moore Gallery Paul said, "These works are varied in their directions, some are
from the Parrot Park series."
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I relate to my experiences in the tropics: Florida, indigenous jungles for tourists and areas not on the tourist map. Since I was a child
I was intrigued with anything that crawled or flew. I spent time at the Toronto Zoo, Riverdale Zoo and went to Tarzan and King Kong movies. I also watched the Wild Kingdom on television."
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"Although my work is abstract it is not without very distinct reference at times. Ambiguity perhaps is part of it as it was with Turner. I try to fuse within the character and
nature of paint a sense of place. The things that excite me will come out. Most of my career has been centered on the Coral Reefs and my experiences with the
landscapes, whether it's northern or tropical is irrelevant to me. I respond the same way
wherever I go. I'm not extremely well traveled, I'm like a sponge. I absorb."
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Title: Emergence in Red, 2006
Artist: Paul Fournier (Canadian b. 1939)
Medium: Acrylic on Canvas
Dimensions: 30"x24"
Photographer: Gokche Erkan
Image Courtesy: The Moore Gallery
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Title: Works on Paper, 2001
Artist: Paul Fournier (Canadian b. 1939)
Image Courtesy: Paul Fournier
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Title: Florida Mirror No. 11, 1976
Artist: Paul Fournier (Canadian b. 1939)
Image Courtesy: Paul Fournier
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"The paintings in this exhibition are extensions of ideas that have formed my work for the past decade.
The emergence series is the most distinct change from the show of 2004 held here at Moore Gallery.
They are simplifications of the Parrot Park series, some of which are also included in this exhibition.
Painterly gestures and shapes float in a mass hovering in the upper part of the paintings.
The clusters of colors emerge out of an atmosphere of a single hue. These works are somewhat minimal
compared to the shape loaded worlds of wonders series, which is full of references to the phenomenon of the
natural world. The world of paint in all it’s different manifestations is a wonder in itself."
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Paul adds, "This show explores varied attitudes in applying paint to canvas. In one extreme I control the laws of
painterly physics and manipulate the paint from thin to thick states to create a type of process painting. Little
evidence of the hand or brush can be observed in these works. In contrast paintings such as Flowering Hillside have
an obvious relationship to the landscape. They are expressionist works, where gestures and strokes of thick paint are directly
applied layer upon layer, building up a dense impasto."
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Title: Opening Night, Music Series, 1982
Artist: Paul Fournier (Canadian b. 1939)
Image Courtesy: Paul Fournier
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Title: Tropic Noon, 1997
Artist: Paul Fournier (Canadian b. 1939)
Image Courtesy: Paul Fournier
"Vibrant colors sing out of the mixture of light and dark gray’s, earth hues,
greens, purples, and blues. Costal geological formations from Ireland, Scotland, and England have haunted me since I first saw them in
1967. Along with aspects of the Canadian landscape these subjects are slowly influencing the direction and character of my work. Only
remote evidence of this is evident in a few of the works in this show. This perhaps makes this a transitory exhibition. I enjoy exploring a
variety of ideas and techniques concurrently and fusing them together to create hybrids. It is the sprit in these works that links the diverse
relationships together into a common whole."
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Title: Overture to Spring, 1978
Artist: Paul Fournier (Canadian b. 1939)
Image Courtesy: Paul Fournier
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Paul explains, "Any painting, regardless of its source of inspiration, is an entity in itself. It's a little world in itself. It's a
personality in itself and it's
that little world that either intrigues you or doesn't. I've always found having one dominating color has an interesting impact on the eye rather than scattered color everywhere."
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Title: Reef Necklace, Coral Reef Series, 1985
Artist: Paul Fournier (Canadian b. 1939)
Image Courtesy: Paul Fournier
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The artist discussed some of his earlier works and series. "People used to refer to my earlier
landscapes as very Turneresque; we had a common intrigue with fog, mists and atmosphere. I
would spend the early morning in the Royal Botanical Gardens near Dundas Marsh in Hamilton. It would be total fog. You could barely see beyond the riverbank. As the morning developed and
the light came the fog lifted and the images came out until finally it was completely clear. That experience stayed with me."
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Title: Amazonas Series
Artist: Paul Fournier (Canadian b. 1939)
Image Courtesy: Paul Fournier
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Paul pointed out, "afterwards my work became slightly more abstract but there is a growing relationship between
the Emergence series," his latest exhibit at the Moore Gallery. "At one extreme is a painting series entitled The World of Wonders. It was
started a few years ago."
Title: Atmospheric Series
Artist: Paul Fournier (Canadian b. 1939)
Image Courtesy: Paul Fournier
In this Paul in his words, "poured paint together and then spray it and perhaps marble it and control it. Whether tipping or blowing I'd allow the paint on the web
canvas to bleed and simply let the process take place but to control it. That's not always easy to do. It takes a lot of experience over the years to realize what will and
won't work. Some of the World of Wonders have been related to sea life or the universe. They have an expansive relationship to the world around us as far as the natural
world."
Title: Coral Reef Series
Artist: Paul Fournier (Canadian b. 1939)
Image Courtesy: Paul Fournier
Another series that Paul worked on, Beginnings, "is more of a Genesis series; an expression of primordial explosions of light and color. I think my intent is to
capture the forces of light and the power that lies behind what is visible and comes from the invisible. The evidence of God's handiwork and his
presence in the world
despite a rather seemly fallen state of dog eat dog. There is still a wonder there and it's almost like a Titanic battle between good and evil, which we see in humanity. We see it in the law of the jungle."
Title: Genesis Series,
Artist: Paul Fournier (Canadian b. 1939)
Image Courtesy: Paul Fournier
Paul says, "The upcoming show has some works that have a landscape orientation so you have something that is distinctly abstract, opposed to something that does relate to
landscape but not in a literal sense. They are more expressionist. They are heavily textured with downward strokes. What you see is what you get, there isn't a sense of process.
It's a controlled technique. When you put a stroke down it's not going to change, unlike doing something on canvas and then watching things take place."
Title: Solomon's Red Blue, 1982
Artist: Paul Fournier (Canadian b. 1939)
Image Courtesy: Paul Fournier
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Title: Scrape Through Series # 1
Artist: Paul Fournier (Canadian b. 1939)
Image Courtesy: Paul Fournier
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The artist discovered, "the landscape itself has been infusing itself back into my efforts in the studio more and more. I do paint far more obvious landscapes. I didn't
include them in this show because they wouldn't really fit. It would confuse issues too much."
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It is part of his future plans. "I intend to do a show of large format paintings
in the next few years. I've always wanted to do large geological cliffs and structures that I have seen in Ireland, England and Scotland and the East coast and hopefully relate
it to Canada. There isn't any evidence of that in the Moore Gallery show."
Title: Scrape Through Series # 2
Artist: Paul Fournier (Canadian b. 1939)
Image Courtesy: Paul Fournier
Paul Fournier concludes, "the show is about a sense of life and place.
I want my paintings to edify life and to edify the spirit of a person."
Paul Fournier
Moore Gallery Toronto:
October 5, 2006 - October 28, 2006
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