At Winchester Galleries on Broad Street

Opening: Saturday, January 7, 2006 10:00 am - 5:30 pm

Exhibition continues until January 28, 2006

Ulysse Comtois was adept at composing with light and dark, colour and shape. Many of but not all his paintings look non-objective but each painting speaks about environment. For instance, his dot paintings are informed by Seurat and landscape and his grid paintings by Vermeer windows and Mondrian light. He varies from the Plasticien, i.e. hard edge colour field Montreal painters, for though he often did hard edge and emphasized colour, his works have realistic references especially to light and gravity, he used a brush - rather than a roller or masking tape, the scale is usually small and painterly qualities are typically in evidence.

Apart from achieving excellence as a painter, Comtois was a renowned sculptor, especially of kinetic aluminum sculpture examples of which showed in 1968 at the Venice Bienale. Comtois, moreover, won the prestigous 1978 Paul-Emile Borduas prize. Comtois's work can be found in many museums in Canada including the National Gallery of Canada.