MMFA: Big Bang

MMFA - the Montreal Museum of Fine Art is currently featuring Big Bang exhibition. It runs from November 6, 2011 to January 22, 2012.  This exhibition was created and produced by the Museum as a celebration of the creative process. A number of contemporary Quebec artists were invited to choose a work from the museum’s permanent collection as a starting point and on the basis of that work let themselves be inspired to create a work of their own. In this way, the museum is paying tribute to Quebec’s creativity.

Nearly 20 artists from various artistic branches, several of them internationally renowned, responded to the Museum’s invitation. As a result, the works of these artists are presented in this show: Jennifer Alleyn and Nancy Huston (film and literature), Denys Arcand and Adad Hannah (film and visual arts), Melissa Auf der Maur (music), Geneviève Cadieux (visial arts), Marie Chouinard (dance), Collectif Rita (design), Claude Cormier (urban design), Jean Derome (music), En masse (mural art), Pierre Lapoint and Jean Verville (music and architecture), Renata Morales (fashion), Wadji Mouawad (theatre), Jeannot Painchaud (circus arts), Rolland Poulin (sculpture), Michel Rabagliatti (comics), and Gilles Saucier (architecture).

Visit the Museum  and see the result of this creative process. Maybe you yourself will be inspired to created a work of your own based on some of the art piece from the Museum’s permanent collection.

I personally was inspired by one of the Museum’s gems to create and propagate my own artistic expression, inline with the Big Bang's objectives. Here is the result. I rather like it and feel it merits attention. If I had the means, I'd make it into a large poster celebrating the MMFA museum.

The painting to the left is by the French painter James Tissot, entitled October, 1877, from MMFA's permanent collection. On the right is my own take on that painting. It is a photo of the enigmatic and vivacious Grand Dame of the Museum, Madame Nathalie Bondil, the MMFA’s director and chief curator. I took this photo during the press conference inaugurating the Big Bang show on November 2, 2011. The postural likeness and expression of both women, and to some extent of their dress and shoes is quire remarkable, though Madame Bondil's look is obviously quite contemporary.

Parallel to Big Bang runs another show, called In My Mind’s Eye, a collection of paintings and other works by Dorothea Rockburne. It is her first Canadian retrospective. She was born and educated in Montreal, but later moved to the United States, where her works are featured in the collections of numerous institutions, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art and MOMA.

The admission to all the Museums exhibitions and collections is currently free.

The painting to the left is by Dorothea Rockburne, entitled Mozart and Mozart Upside Down and Backwards, 1985-87.





For more information visit the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts' website

http://www.mbam.qc.ca/en/index.html