Artist Statement/ Biography

Since 2007, Frédérique Ulman-Gagné has activated an abstract language in large-scale paintings. Colour is continually accumulated from one painting to the next, in a sense tracing the narrative of the creative process by way of spontaneous gestures. Fragmented, repetitive and sometimes unfinished, the work alternates between excess and simplicity. The artist creates precise volumes that coexist with other more restless forms to trigger a dynamic between the elementary components of painting. The large-scale formats prompt a relationship to the support, reminiscent of a child’s perspective or of a viewer’s position before big historical paintings and their towering figures. The spontaneous use of these forms highlights accidents such as stains or destruction in order to address tragedy in painting in its simplest dimension.

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Frédérique Ulman-Gagné was born in 1982 in Montreal. She holds a BFA from Concordia University (2007) and a MFA from the University of Québec in Montreal (2010). Her work has been presented individually and collectively in Montreal at Les Territoires (2012), at Powerhouse Gallery (2013), at Dominique Bouffard Gallery (2016) and at the McClure Gallery (2017), in France at Gallery RDV in Nantes (2014) and in Iceland at SIM gallery (2013). She has been an artist in residency in Reykjavik (Samband Islenska myndlistarmanna) and in St-Jean-Port-Joli (Est-Nord-Est). She has received grants from the Quebec and the Canada Arts Council and her work is part of several private art collections.