David Bolduc
David Bolduc (1945–2010) was a Canadian abstract artist. He was born on February 10, 1945, in Toronto, Ontario, and died of brain cancer on April 8, 2010, in Brockville, Ontario. He was considered to be one of the artists that helped develop a new era of Abstract Expressionism in Toronto. He is known for his central image paintings and his use of colour and texture in his works.
He attended the Ontario College of Art in Toronto from 1962 to 1963 and the Montreal Museum of Fine Art’s School of Art and Design from 1964 to 1965. He returned to Toronto in 1966 when he got a job at the Royal Ontario Museum’s conservation department. Henri Mattise became a large source of inspiration for Bolduc after he attended a retrospective exhibition of Matisse’s work in Paris in 1970. He also drew inspiration from exotic scenes found during his many travels around the world, including to places such as Nepal, India, Morocco, Turkey, Uzbekistan, etc. He also worked for many years in Paris and Morocco in the 1990s.
Shortly after 1967, Bolduc started to abandon colour in his artwork in favour of working with a minimalistic style consisting of stretched vinyl, rope, wood, and mirrors. Prior to this shift, he had been using colourful geometric designs and textured surfaces on shaped canvases. However, this style changed once again in the mid-1970s when Bolduc began to develop a style of central imagery abstracts. This involved placing an image (typically a recognizable subject such as a tree, a person, etc.) vertically on a canvas that is then painted/stained with an abstracted background. Sometimes the central image is repeated throughout the background. Whereas the background is often textured with a limited colour palette, the central image is often vibrantly coloured and acts as the focal point for the viewer.
His work was exhibited internationally, with the most significant exhibition being 14 Canadians: a Critic’s Choice in 1977 in Washington, D.C. Beginning in the mid-1970s, his work was exhibited in many exhibitions featuring Toronto’s abstract artists. Other notable exhibitions include a show held at David Mirvish Gallery in 1976 and a memorial exhibition at Christopher Cutts Gallery in 2010. His work can be found in many major collections, including the National Gallery of Canada and the Art Gallery of Ontario, among others.