Sculpture has many qualities, Francine Laurin's work demonstrates them all eloquently. It is a typical and successful example of current sculpture. She not only sculpts but also teaches and lectures, and has been a member of the Conseil de la sculpture since I987.
Born in Lachute, Francine Laurin was an artist from the start. After college, she studied art at UQAM and Concordia as she began to specialize in treated glass, bronze, fiber glass, resin, ceramics and wax molding.
What makes one become a sculptor? Unlike painting which stems from an understandable urge to cover bare surfaces with symbols or shapes, sculpting seemingly appears unexplicably in the air like another being, a rival to people, plants, and buildings. Somehow this rivalry grows all the more intense when the humans and animals are as lively as those in Francine Laurin's sculptures.
Sculpture of course is more tangible than painting. With all due respect to other artists and critics, the first art form is illusion; the second, an allusion. Sculpture is often synonymous with difficult work because some of the materials are indeed very difficult. The comparison with the surrounding reali-ty is both easy and compromising. It is the third dimension that appeals to the critical eye. Iust imagine all the subjects impossible to sculpt like clouds and fluids.
While adopting mythical or legendary figures, she attempts to awaken the material, make it escape the gripping force of gravity and materialism. Her sculpture is a centrifuge of sorts. She loses herself in her world only to be liberated. Francine Laurin has heard the message of Brancusi, Lipchitz and Boccioni. As a result, movement has become her main goal, her true theme, her preferred medium. The patina comes afterward to ensure the purity and fluidity of the shapes she creates.
Feminine shapes lend themselves easily to Francine's form of expression. She gives them tremendous lightness, wings even, whose primary function is to enhance their immaterial character as well as their symbolism. |
