Jean Paul Lemieux

1904-1990

Jean Paul Lemieux was born in Quebec City, Quebec. The family spent their summers near Montmorency Falls and Kent House, where in 1914 Jean Paul met a painter by the name of Parnell who had a studio in Kent House. After watching Parnell work, Lemieux started sketching on his own. In 1917 the Lemieux’s settled in Montreal where Jean Paul attended College Mont Saint-Louis and later Loyola College. In 1926, having decided to become an artist, Lemieux entered the École des Beaux-Arts de Montréal where he studied under Charles Maillard, Edwin Holgate and others. He studied there for three years and after obtaining his diploma, he spent one year in Paris where he studied at the Académie de la Grande-Chaumière and at Académie Colarossi. It was also in Paris that Lemieux met Clarence Gagnon.

From 1931 to 1934, Lemieux returned to the École des Beaux-Arts de Montréal to obtain a teaching diploma. When he completed his studies in 1934, he was named assistant professor at the Beaux-Arts. He also won the Brymner Prize for one of his painting at the Art Association of Montreal that same year. In 1935, he became professor of drawing and painting at École du Meuble. During this period, he often visited the studio of Edwin Holgate, his former art teacher. In 1937, Lemieux moved back to Quebec City where he resumed his teaching career at École des Beaux-Arts de Québec, a position he held until 1967. His teaching post at École du Meuble was then filled by Paul-Émile Borduas who was later introduced to Alfred Pellan by Lemieux in 1940. Still in 1937, he married Madeleine Desrosiers, an art student he had met at École des Beaux-Arts in Montreal.

For the next fifteen years or so, Lemieux spent his summers at Les Éboulements and at Port-Au-Persil in the Charlevoix region, where he painted with other artists, including Goodridge Roberts and Edmund Alleyn. In 1951, Lemieux won first prize in the Quebec Painting Contest and was made an Associate of the Royal Canadian Academy.  In 1954, Lemieux was awarded a Canada Council Scholarship and spent a year in France. That same year he also had a one-man show at the Palais Montcalm in Quebec City. During the next five years, he took part at many important international exhibitions including the Sao Paolo Biennale in Brazil (1957), Canadian Biennale (1957, 1959), Brussels World Fair (1958), Pittsburgh International Exhibition (1958) and the Venice Biennale (1960).

By the 1960’s Lemieux’s paintings were mainly of quaint lonely figures in austere landscapes, a style for which he would be known for the rest of his career. In the years leading to his resignation as a teacher from the École des Beaux-Arts in 1967, Lemieux kept exhibiting in various exhibitions, notably in a group show of Canadian painters in Warshaw held under the sponsorship of the National Gallery of Canada (1962), at the 5th Canadian Biennial (1963), at an exhibition of Canadian painters organized by the Museum of Modern Art in New York (1963), at the Eleven Canadian Artists exhibition held at the Tate Gallery in London (1963) and at the Sept Peintres Canadiens exhibition held at the Musée Galliera in Paris (1963). He also exhibited in various private galleries in Canada.

After leaving his teaching profession in 1967, Lemieux moved to Île-aux-Coudres, Quebec, where he spent the rest of his life. In 1966 he was made a  member of the Royal Canadian Academy and the following year, he was honoured by the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts and the National Gallery of Canada by a retrospective exhibition. That same year he participated at the group shows Three Hundred Years of  Canadian Art organized by the National Gallery of Canada to mark the Centenary of Canada’s federation and Panorama de la peinture au Québec at the Musée d’Art Contemporain de Montréal. Still in 1967, he was awarded the Canada Council Medal and the following year was made a companion of the Order of Canada. Over the next two decades, he received honorary degrees from Université Laval (1969) Bishop’s University (1970), Université de Montréal (1980) and Concordia University (1985). In 1971, he illustrated Gabrielle Roy’s 1950 novel La Petite Poule d’eau and received the Louis-Philippe Hébert Prize from the Société Saint-Jean-Baptiste. He also received the Molson prize for the Canada Council for the Arts in 1973. In 1974, the Quebec Government asked the Musée National des Beaux-Arts du Québec to organise a travelling retrospective show of Lemieux’s work. It travelled to Moscow and Leningrad in Russia, and later to Prague and Antwerp and was a great success. In 1981, he illustrated another book, Louis Hémon’s Maria Chapdelaine, that Clarence Gagnon had also illustrated many years before.

Lemieux died in 1990 at the age of 86. Following his death, he was made a member of l’Académie des Grands Québécois (1990) and Grand Officer of the National Order of Québec (1997). Furthermore, retrospective shows were held at the Musée National des Beaux-Arts du Québec in 1992, 2004 and 2007, and at the National Gallery of Canada in 2004.

Collections:

- National Gallery of Canada (Ottawa, ON)
- Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (Montreal, QC)
- Musée d’Art Contemporain de Montréal (Montreal, QC)
- Musée National des Beaux-Arts du Québec (Quebec City, QC)
- Musée du Bas St-Laurent (Rivière-du-Loup, QC)
- McCord Museum of Canadian History (Montreal, QC)
- Museum London (London, ON)
- Vancouver Art Gallery (Vancouver, BC)
- Art Gallery of Nova Scotia (Halifax, NS)
- Art Gallery of Ontario (Toronto, ON)
- Art Gallery of Hamilton (Hamilton, ON)
- The Winnipeg Art Gallery (Winnipeg, MN)
- Firestone Art Collection (Ottawa, ON)
- Confederation Centre Art Gallery and Museum (Charlottetown, PEI)
- Mendel Art Gallery (Saskatoon, SK)
- Musée de Lachine (Lachine, QC)
- Musée Louis-Hémon (Péribonka, QC)
- Concordia University (Montreal, QC)
- Université de Montréal (Montreal, QC)
- Corporation of the City of Kingston (Kingston, ON)
- Royal bank of Canada (Toronto, ON)
- Power Corporation of Canada (Montreal, QC)

Affiliations:

- Associate of the Royal Canadian Academy (1951)
- Royal Canadian Academy (1966)
- Order of Canada (1968)