Throughout our history, sports and art have frequently rubbed shoulders, creating an undeniable relationship between two worlds that are so close, yet so far apart, but that both in their own way move people deeply.
As recognition of this reality, two striking public works of art will decorate the common areas of Place Bell. On the Place Bell grounds very close to the main entrance, Michel Goulet’s Faire la vague will serve as a magnificent welcome to visitors, whereas in the lobby, the shapes of the artist Louis Viger’s, La voie des souffles will sparkle and shine gold, silver and bronze.
Faire la vague - Michel Goulet
Located a few steps from the main entrance to the building, fourteen tall poles will be aligned and organized into two rows, creating a welcoming passageway that is indicated on the ground by two long rows of lights. The poles will have more than seventy very large white ribbons at various heights that will wave in all directions. Points of light, sparkles and flashes will accentuate their movements. As the ribbons light up, a flood of coloured sparkles will come to life and emphasize their waving. The light show will not always be the same; it includes surprises and rhythms that reinvent themselves. Often, things will go quiet only to explode into a shower of light akin to fireworks.
While amplitude, strength and progression define a wave, it can also be harmonious when the term refers to the ritual crowds partake in when they want to encourage their team, knowing that they are an integral part of a community. The wave is the very image of social cohesion.
Faire la vague expresses belonging to a group by proudly displaying colours of celebration and freedom. It also expresses the idea of surpassing oneself, of pleasure and triumph, and finally, by closing the ranks to create a passage, true solidarity.
Michel Goulet – Sculptor
Renowned for his undeniable contribution to public art, sculptor Michel Goulet has created more than forty permanent works. In 1990, he created a work for the Doris Freedman Plaza, Central Park, New York, and that same year the Ville de Montréal ordered a monumental work for the Place Roy which has become a leading example of public art. The Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal mounted a major retrospective of his work in 2004.
Some of his works can be found in Le Havre (first Le Havre Biennale), on the Belvédère Abbé Larue in Lyon, along the central lane of an urban park in Québec City, in downtown Toronto and on Vancouver’s waterfront beaches. Recently, he created a permanent sculpture in Charleville-Mézières, Rimbaud’s hometown.
In l988, he represented Canada at the Venice Biennale and received in 1990 the Prix Paul-Émile-Borduas, the highest distinction granted to a visual artist by the Gouvernement du Québec. In 2008, he won a Governor General’s Award and in 2010, the Université de Sherbrooke presented him an honorary doctorate. Recently, he was named a Member of the Order of Canada (2012).
La voie des souffles - Louise Viger
This suspended sculptural work installed in a three-level space embodies a concept of sculpture that doesn’t want to impose its mass, but rather draw viewers in. As seen from the stairs, an ensemble of elements of three distinct shapes and significant colours – gold, silver, bronze – repeat themselves. The sixty-five pieces in the work wind through the space.
The perception of the work changes according to the viewer’s position and movement; close by, the eye perceives the textures and the visible overlaps in the transparency of the material more; farther away the eye perceives the work as a whole for a more global perspective.
La voie des souffles is an observation that calls on both the architectural personality of the space and the multifunctional vocation of the building as expressed through the vibrant accumulation of attitudes, performances by athletes and artists in the spotlight as so many infinite fragments of a light show that marks the audience with its imprint.
The work therefore integrates two approaches, two actions: integrating and adding.
Finally, La voie des souffles presents itself as a moving choreography of arrangements and attitudes.
Louise Viger – Sculptor
Since 1980, the works of sculptor Louise Viger have been the subject of many individual exhibits in Quebec – both in galleries and at the Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal and the Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec – as well as elsewhere in Canada and abroad.
Her work has also been included in several collective exhibits including Canada Collects: Contemporary Sculptures from the Art Bank, that travelled in the United States; and Seeing in Tongues, Le bout de la langue, in Canada. A monumental installation was presented at the Parc du Mont-Royal, as part of the Artefact 2004, sculptures urbaines event in Montréal.
To date, Louise Viger has participated in some twenty public art competitions as a finalist and has created a dozen public sculptures including Voix sans bruit, 2005, destined for the Bibliothèque nationale du Québec; for the Grande Bibliothèque in Montréal, Des lauriers pour mémoire, 2008, in tribute to Jean Duceppe; as well as Le même, mais différent, a suspended work that was installed in 2014 at the École Notre-Dame-de-Grâce. In 2015, her work entitled Une architecture d’air was mounted in the Place Hector-Prud’homme in the Plaza St-Hubert, while La traversée des lucioles is now part of the collection at the new CHUM.
She advocates that lightness is a positive value in the face of the world’s heaviness and opacity.
Henri Richard, a great among greats - Louise Lemieux
The work is composed of woven interpretations of photographs recalling Henri Richard, both as a man and as a field hockey player. The artist reworked, cropped and converted archival photographs into black-and-white, in addition to using the poem inscribed on the walls of the Montreal Canadiens dressing room.
Henri Richard, born in Montreal on February 29, 1936, but a resident of Laval since 1962, is a professional field hockey player who played his entire career with the Canadiens, captaining the team from 1971 onwards. In 1974, he won the Bill Masterton Trophy, and a year later his number 16 jersey was retired. In 1979, he was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame and is the only player to have won 11 Stanley Cups.
Louise Lemieux Bérubé - Weaving artist
Louise Lemieux Bérubé is a weaving artist recognized internationally for her works in Jacquard and digitized embroidery. In 2013, she was awarded the medal of chevalière de l’Ordre national du Québec, and in 2015, the Ordre du Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec.