Born in St. Thomas, Ontario, Roland Poulin moved to Montréal with his family when he was four. He is a graduate of the École des beaux-arts de Montréal, and his works are in numerous public collections. In 1994, the National Gallery of Canada presented a retrospective of his works, and in 1999, the Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal also presented an exhibition devoted to his works. On the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the Ordre national du Québec, he created Nos regards se tournent vers la lumière (2010), a work of public art situated at the western entrance to Promenade Samuel-De Champlain, in Québec City.
Artwork description
Installed on the bank of the St. Lawrence River, in Parc de la Promenade-Bellerive, is Continuum 2009 (à la mémoire de Pierre Perrault), an abstract artwork composed of three elements made of Corten steel. These elements form a series of vertical and horizontal planes that frame an empty space. In this sense, the artwork stands as a window on the site, offering privileged points of view on the landscape and the activities that take place in the park.
People and their living environment were always central to Pierre Perrault’s work, and Roland Poulin wanted to pay tribute to the filmmaker by offering, in his turn, an artwork that highlighted the site and people, who could become participants in the artwork by crossing through its frame.
The sculpture offers a fluid space between the real and the fictional, between the site and the sculpture, and between nature and sculpture.
– Roland Poulin