Yechel Gagnon

Yechel Gagnon was born in Longueil (Quebec) in 1973. She began her studies at the Ontario College of Art and Design in Toronto, then received a Master’s degree in visual arts at Concordia University in Montreal in 2000. Since 1996, she has participated in many collective exhibitions as well as doing solo exhibitions in Quebec, Ontario and France. The quality of her work was awarded with scholarships and prizes. Her pieces currently lie in private and museum collections. Notably in the Nova Scotia Museum of Fine Arts, the Gotland Museum of Fine Arts (Sweden), the Osler Hoskins & Harcourt Collection in Toronto.
Osmose marks the artist’s first participation in the Programme d’intégration des arts à l’architecture et à l’environnement. Yechel Gagnon then created Vortex in 2007 at Bishop University in Sherbrooke, Méridiens in Gatineau, Le courant de la mémoire in Ville de Sainte-Catherine in 2009, and Entre ciel et terre, Entre brume et nuage in 2010 for the Collège Jean-de-Brébeuf in Montréal.
In 1996, while studying in Ontario, Gagnon discovered the infinite qualities that plywood’s stratifications had to offer. She also discovered Paterson Ewen’s artwork that same year at the Ontario Museum of Fine Arts.
Though she mostly sculpts with plywood, Gagnon also uses other techniques such as drawing, engraving and installation. In her artistic work, she explores the tension between what is natural and artificial. Her pieces are often very spacious and evoke timeless moments of introspection and getting in touch with nature.