"On the cover of the book, a detail from a painting by Clara Grouazel. We see two large eggs standing upright and motionless in the shadows. The one in the foreground is delicately cracked. From this fissure emerges a slender leafy stem—a timid sprout. A symbol of underground life and renewal in the dark, of fertile silence.
Aside from The Milkmaid by de Vermeer which is discussed in the collection, no better illustration could have been found to accompany and represent Hélène Robitaille's project »
Les cigales en hiver by Hélène Robitaille, Québec, L'Instant même, 2006, 127 p. (ISBN 2-89502-226-7). Cover: Clara Grouazel.
Art Reviews
Patrick Beauduin
Senior Vice President and Chief Creative Officer, COSSETTE COMMUNICATION, Montreal
Member of the Montreal Arts Council
Image Analysis Columnist, Indicatif Présent, Radio-Canada
"Content, form...
The eternal debate of perception,
an incestuous question,
often cold and barren.
With Clara Grouazel:
Textures as content.
Subjects as content.
Form—period!
A powerful encounter
between heavy, intense colors
echoing a Renaissance past
and surreal, unusual subjects
floating across oversized canvases.
In these times of digitization
and obsessive virtual realities,
Clara Grouazel invites us
to once again lose our thoughts
in the depths of eternal oil paint,
in the enigmatic superimposition
of themes that breathe long
and sometimes with a haunting rhythm.
A contemporary artistic expression
firmly rooted in the history
of painting, honored with the Gold Medal
from the National Academy of Fine Arts – N.A.F.A, Brazil."