Basque, Léonard Parent

Technique: Oil, Indian ink wash

1927-2016

Born in Trois-Pistoles, a small town in the Lower St. Lawrence across from Île aux Basques, his namesake.

He showed an interest in drawing and painting during his youth. During a one-year stay in Europe in 1954, he visited the most splendid museums and closely studied masterpieces by great European masters. Having been painting since 1948, Basque has drawn on his vast experience and indisputable talent to develop a highly personal technique. Inspired by nature, his paintings depict the Lower St. Lawrence region, calling forth its rhythms and colours.

In addition to oil paintings, Basque is also admired for his Indian ink washes from which human emotions burst : "I want to touch the very soul of people and things through transparency and inner light, charged with emotion and mystery," he said.

After devoting twenty years of his life to religion, Basque married. Since 1979 he has focused on painting and teaching. He has taught Art History and oil painting techniques in various workshops, some in the Lower St. Lawrence, at the Faculty of Science and Education, at the University of Quebec in Rimouski.

In 1983, the eminent Montreal art historian, Guy Boulizon, published a book on Basque in which he officially recognized Basque as a leading figure in current Quebec painting.

Exhibitions

• Montreal Museum of Fine Arts
• Zanettin Gallery, Quebec City
• Toronto
• Sherbrooke
• Chicoutimi
• Rimouski
• etc.

Collections

• Numerous collectors in Canada and the United States have acquired works by Parent-Basque