Born in Warsaw, Poland, Jacek Jarnuszkiewicz comes from a family of sculptors who moved to Québec in 1963. He holds a bachelor’s degree in art history and visual arts from the Université de Montréal (1978) and a master’s degree in visual arts from Concordia University (1982). He has created numerous artworks in the public space, including L’homme est un roseau pensant III (2007) in the Cartier Métro station in Laval, and Dialogue inaltérable (2009) in Burlington, Vermont.
This stainless-steel sculpture about ten meters high represents Quebec’s biggest tourist attraction: nature. More specifically, it evokes the ever-growing and ever-changing plant world. The sculpture is an almost archetypal representation of four blades of grass, which also pay homage to neighbouring Square Saint-Louis. Aromatic herbs are used in hotels and restaurants, and they are also wonderfully tenacious plants that find their way into the slightest pavement crack to create life in our cities. In addition to hotels, restaurants, tourism and nature, the four blades of grass also represent the very Quebec soil in which they grow. Together, the abstract rendering of four vertical lines and one horizontal line comes together as five elements to produce a slightly off-balance symmetry.