Georgette Bourgeois's Renaissance series on display at Assumption Gallery

10/5/2014 12:00:00 AM

The Assumption Gallery will be teaming up for a third time with Georgette Bourgeois to present an exhibition of her work entitled RENAISSANCE. Eight paintings created by the New Brunswick–based artist, who was born and grew up in Moncton, will be on view in September and October 2014.

Bourgeois’s art reflects her interest in the history and evolution of Acadia, and this collection in particular symbolizes the strength of the Acadian Renaissance. With her choice of primary yellows, reds and blues and the effects of light in her canvases, she strives to reflect the radiance, fortitude and vitality of the Acadian people in the period spanning 1900 to 1930.

“In creating the RENAISSANCE series, I wanted to take a contemporary approach to portraying the magnificent historical buildings built between 1900 and 1930 in the new section of the Village historique acadien, near Caraquet,” says Bourgeois. “I sought to come up with images that capture these buildings from dramatic angles. When light strikes them, it produces intensely dark shadows and gives them their own personality.”

Bourgeois works mainly with oils in a figurative style. The themes she chooses evoke Acadia, from its beginning, before and after the Deportation of 1755, to the contemporary Acadia, whose history has thrust it onto the international stage.

“Acadia really gets my creative juices flowing. I paint it because it’s inside me, it’s part of my soul. I firmly believe that an artist’s vision can help define the community’s identity. And in this quest for identity, I want to focus on the evolution, intellectual journey and social status experienced by the Acadians,” she adds.

Bourgeois has been profoundly influenced by celebrated American painter Edward Hopper, especially as regards his treatment of light and shadows on typical 1930s American architecture. She has shown her work in Louisiana, France and Canadaand has over 50 solo exhibitions to her credit.