Quebec-Acadia Residencies
From August 26, 2024, to June 18, 2025
Gare de Matapedia launches three-year exchange project with Acadia
As part of the Quebec-Acadia Residencies, artists will spend three months alternating between Fonderie Darling in Montreal, Gare de Matapédia in Gaspésie, Galerie Sans Nom in Moncton and Projet Borgitte in Cap-Pelé. A residency presentation will be held at each of the host venues, as well as at Galerie Universitaire Louise-et-Reuben-Cohen in Moncton. This three-year exchange program aims to strengthen ties between Canada's French-speaking communities, while showcasing Acadian culture. It also aims to bring the Quebec and New Brunswick art scenes closer together through collaboration between artist-run centers and residencies.
Marie Ségolène Brault (QC), Carolyne Scenna (QC), Pierre Durette (QC), Annie France Noël (N-B), and Rothchild Choisy (N-B) are the recipients of the first-ever Quebec-Acadie Residencies.
Residency #4 - Annie France Noël (Moncton, N-B) is interested in the mediums of photography, video, sound and poetry.
Rite, 2024, cyanotype on cotton, grease pencil on glass and linen passe-partout, 43cm x 43cm
Annie France Noël focuses her practice on notions of intimacy and vulnerability. Her themes are inspired in particular by her experience of parenthood, during which identity and memory revolve around caring. During her residency, which takes place mainly at the Darling Foundry, the artist plans to create a performance linked to her experience as a mother, with the aim of reaching a target audience interested in the sociological issues surrounding motherhood. At the Matapédia train station, the artist will be in contact with the Centr'Elles organization, which promotes discussions between local women.
From January 21, 2025, the following artists will be hosted:
Residency #2 - Carolyne Scenna (Montreal, QC) works with sculpture, experimental animation techniques, sound and print.
FOCUSFOCUS FOCUS FOCUS FOCUS, 2023, plaster cast tiles, monotypes containing pigment, insects, paper, textile, wood, gypsum, cardboard, 558cm x 320cm
Carolyne Scenna's multidisciplinary approach focuses on sculpture, experimental animation techniques, sound and print. Through material and imposing installations, the artist questions our sensitive relationship to images and built environments, and aspires to the dismantling of their social and hierarchical structures. As part of her residency, which takes place for 1 month in Matapedia, 1 month in Moncton and 1 month in Cap-Pelé, she is developing a sculptural installation project superimposing the loss of her own vision on the disappearance of regional vestiges, associating visual blindness with the extinction of regional heritage.
Residency #3 - Pierre Durette (Causapscal, QC) focuses his practice on drawing, sculpture and printmaking.
Le délabrement des possibles 4, 2023, coloured pencil on acid-free Stonehenge paper, 76cm x 112cm
In his drawings and sculptures, Pierre Durette blurs spatio-temporal reference points in frescoes with disconcerting compositions where historical images intermingle with a world born of science fiction. Living in a small Gaspésie town far from major urban centers, this will be an opportunity for him to get closer to regional partners and extend his network to Montreal, where he will spend most of his time. At Fonderie Darling, he intends to use the Atelier Technique to create ceramic pieces and printing plates, and will be able to connect with school and university groups to talk about his working techniques.
Residence #5 - Rothchild Choisy (Riverview, N-B) paints figuratively on paper and canvas, and makes papier-mache masks.
Rotchild Choisy is a multidisciplinary artist working primarily in painting. His work is rooted in a process of introspection and retrospection that reveals variants and singularities of identity. His project for this residency is to explore how masks, clothing, bodily attitudes and the environment play a determining role in the construction and/or interpretation of identity and social interactions. His residency will take place partly in Matapedia, where the community will be enriched by the presence of an Afro-descendant artist, and in Montreal, where he will be able to connect with the large local Haitian community, Fonderie Darling having greatly developed its network of artists and audiences belonging to this community.
Following the evaluation of nearly sixty applications, the selection committee, made up of partner organizations and Acadian artist Rémi Belliveau, chose these artists for the quality of their work, the clarity of their proposal, and the relevance of the residency project and its impact on the community and in the development of their professional career.
The Quebec-Acadie Residencies are made possible by the generous support of our partners: the Canada Council for the Arts, the Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec, Arts et Culture NB , Via Rail, the Municipality de Matapedia and the MRC Avignon.
Residency #1 by Marie Ségolène Brault (Montreal, QC) - August 26 to November 3, Gare de Matapédia - Pôle artistique et communautaire, then on to New Brunswick.
OTO Portrait 11, 2023, serigraphy and watercolour, 25cm x 20cm
Marie Ségolène Brault's artistic practice is first based on writing, then transforms into performance and sculptural installation that appear as destabilizing environments, filled with their own symbology and coded references, among familiar found objects, household and office items and organic ingredients. During her residency, the artist hopes to connect with numerous fishing guides to develop a performance around fly casting.
Marie Ségolène Brault is the founder and director of Espace Maurice in Montreal, an alternative space dedicated to the visual arts. The artist holds a master's degree in performance art from the Art Institute of Chicago.