Biography

Sebastian Maltais is a painter who divides his time between the Îles-de-la-Madeleine and Montreal. Since 2000, the ancient technique of encaustic is his favorite medium.  Recognized Quebec painter, his works can be found in public and private collections such as those of the Fédération des Caisses Desjardins, Loto-Québec and the Cirque du Soleil. Sébastian Maltais is interested in the human figure and especially the portraits. His choice of encaustic painting is as much related to the historicity of this method as to the technical rigor it imposes. The artist thus confronts his contemporary history with the history of art and one of its oldest techniques.

Chorale (2023)

Developed for this edition, the installation, Chorale, questions the possibility of “making history” together from a set of different voices and paths. Floating in space, 18 portraits of choirboys seem to begin a song where stories are celebrated without being crossed out. By committing himself for the first time to a three-dimensional installation, the artist sets an example by stepping out of his comfort zone. He enjoins us in return not to be afraid of the chaos or the difficulty of dialogue that might arise from the relationship between choir and sound system. He gives “voice” in a masterly way these words of Edouard Glissant: “it is possible to approach this chaos, to endure and to grow in this unpredictable, to go against its certainties embedded in their intolerances, to ‘palpitate of the very palpitation of the world’ which is to be discovered.”