In 1978, Claude St-Jacques completed her Fine Arts studies at UQAM. Since then, she has participated in numerous group and solo exhibitions through which many private and public collectors have acquired her works. Today, at a pivotal moment in her career, the artist knows very well that nothing is ever guaranteed in the wonderful world of the arts. She wishes for nothing more than to be respected by her peers and to continue making a living from her work. Fame, fortune, love — the simple things in life!

For three weeks last May, she presented some thirty recent paintings at Galerie Simon Blais. The event received extensive media coverage; newspaper articles, television and radio interviews all contributed to the exhibition’s visibility. Large canvases as well as “recession-size” formats — more than half found buyers: three or four private individuals fell instantly in love with particular works, one corporate collector purchased three at once, and many admirers were charmed. On one sunny Saturday, a young boy was even seen sketching one of the exhibition’s paintings to show to his class! At that point, one can no longer speak merely of critical success, but of genuine success — success due unquestionably to the quality of the paintings themselves.

Through warm golds and ultramarine blues, through discreet figuration or pure abstraction, Claude St-Jacques’s canvases both question and seduce. There are the three Penelopes, intriguing with their feminine forms seemingly drawn from medieval statuary. There is the six-part Indochina series, suggesting the precious, almost iconographic quality of old objects skillfully rearranged. And there are the very contemporary abstractions whose frieze-like compositions invite a sense of intimacy with the viewer. One constant emerges from all of them: the paintings radiate warmth. One cannot remain indifferent to them.

“I simply believe my clients recognized themselves in the work,” Simon Blais confided to me. “Unlike other works that are equally valid, Claude St-Jacques’s production feels open-ended. Far from being closed within its own artistic discourse, it leaves room for the interpretation the viewer wishes to bring to it. In that sense, the work is never hermetic.”