Category: Press articles

Qualité Québec

Born in Montreal, Joëlle Le Blanc has completed stoneware and porcelain engraving and painting stages in various Montreal workshops since 1979. In 1991, she began practising engraving at the Evelyne-Dufour workshop in Montreal. Also a drawer she masters dry-point, etching and lithography. She held solo and group exhibitions in Quebec and in the United States. She is a member of several associations including the Quebec Arts Trade Committee and the Quebec Engraving Committee.

An excellent drawer who is influenced by hyperrealism, she is particularly fond of black and white contrasts and has developed an inking technique that allows her to emphasise contrasts and better her subject’s outline. She often touches up her engravings so that, in fact, most of them are unique.

This is the first exhibition for several artist. Such is the case for Joëlle B. Le Blanc of Montreal who specialises in engraving. Her booth can be found in the ”Relève” (artists of tomorrow) section where she exhibits black and white works created according to a special technique which is explained on video tape.

Saint-Malo, An Historic Engraving

Since July 20 and until October 6, the Halleau Blé in Saint-Malo is proposing a rare and beautiful engraving exhibition. “An Historic Engraving” (Une estampe une histoire) allows to study the details of an engraving through its history and its creation technique.
Louis Garneray still maintains 18th century tradition through his series of French port paintings. Around 1823, he painted a small size canvas representing the city fortified by its ramparts and its port seen from the Talards, by stormy weather and troubled sea giving a particularly gripping and almost dramatic view of Saint Malo at that time. During those same years, Norman, Charles-Louis Mozin executed the largest aquatint technique etching with Saint-Malo as its subject. It is the wreck of the Prussian drogue (fishing and coastal boat) “le Frédéric” on the rocks of Fort Royal outside the Fort national on March 15, 1829. This wreck theme so dear to romantics and again used, around 1840 by Ferdinand Perrot who, moreover, executed a large coloured lithography representing the access to the city by the “route deDol”, that is by the Sillon.

This very touching work is one of the most recent acquisitions by the city museum.
The wreck of the “Frédéric” is an aquatint technique etching, that is the plate is covered with resin on which the artist executes his drawingby removing the metal; the plate is then submerged into an acid bath which eats into the grooves made: this is the most common engraving technique; it allows a freer and more spontaneous drawing, and allows to produce flat dyes and wash-drawing effects.

Étude historique : Philippe Petout
Conservateur et conseils techniques: J. B. Le Blanc.

Until July 21st, this young painter-engraver from Montreal is the Quebec Art Trades (métiers d’art du Québec) representative.

She has a unique ink and engraving technique. A specialist of black and white, one of her great forces lies in her hyperrealis tbut always poetically tinged well-balanced works.

She developed her passion for engraving when she was very young and it is still with her after twenty-five years. Her careerhas been more particularly successful these last few years during which she has won several prizes at the national and international level. During her stay at the Maison du Québec this young visual art artist reveals, with the same passion and poetry, some of her trade secrets. Explanations, exhibitions and demonstrations await visitors who will be called upon to participate.

A few days ago, Joëlle B. Le Blanc, a young 32-year old artist, was awarded the jury’s first prize in the “Mountain, River and Village” (Montagne, rivière et village) exhibition-competition which brought together no less than 250 artists from across Quebec to Saint-Hilaire.

7,000 visitors were able to admire paintings and works from exhibiting artists and Joëlle, who graduated with a DEC in Arts at the Édouard-Monpetit College in Longueuil, was awarded her prize along with a $1,200 purse thanks to Fusion, a black and white ink work which won over the competition’s judges.