Pierre-Gilles Dubois was born in Lachine on 4 May 1938. He studied at the École des beaux-arts de Montréal (1955–60), and then earned a diploma in psychopedagogy. After teaching education through art at the Université de Montréal, he decided, in the early 1970s, to devote himself exclusively to painting and sculpture. He then had works on display regularly in Québec and France. For the Lachine Borough boardroom, he produced a mural relating the history of Lachine. He died in Saint-Hyacinthe in 1995.
Artwork description
The artwork is presented in Place de l’Hôtel-de-Ville, in Lachine Borough. Four large female figures, sculpted of Norwegian blue anorthosite, are set in the centre of a circular basin. Looking in opposing directions, they symbolize fire, air, water, and earth.
The human figure, especially the female figure, was of the artist’s preferred subjects. Influenced by the archetype theories of Carl G. Jung, Dubois chose throughout his career to produce figurative, yet dreamlike, artworks.