Robert P. Roy
Please click here to be added to Robert P. Roy's special interest list.
Québecois artist Robert P. Roy was interested in drawing and painting from a very young age. Torn between art or science as a career choice, he elected engineering at the Université de Sherbrooke. He did, however, continue to take art lessons during those studies and also studied painting at McGill University, Concordia University and with independent teachers. He later studied at the Saïdye Bronfman Centre for two years. He also attended numerous intensive workshops. In 1995, he won first prize at the Concours d’Art de Pierrefonds and an honorable mention in 1997. He had his first solo gallery exhibition in 2005 and was named the 2006 Artist of the Year of the Kirkland Artists Association. In 2008, he won second prize at the prestigious art competition Rêves d’Automne in Baie St-Paul, Charlevoix, Qc. In 2010, he was selected to represent Québec in an artistic and cultural exchange with Spain called Couleurs Sur le Monde, part of the Rêves d’Automne artistic annual event. This week-long event with renowned Spanish artists was a rich artistic and cultural experience. He participates in numerous other art symposiums as well. Magazin Art, an important art magazine in Québec, published an article on his work in its Winter 2009-2010 edition (see below).
Artist’s Statement
Painting is an act which comes from the interior, of the heart. So, my painting is a continual effort of interpretation of the subject based on a play of balance between the three pillars of my research, which are color, form and movement. I move away from the faithful copy of the subject which, for me, limits the possibility of creating a personal work. I want to translate the subject according to my own language. I want my painting to be personal in its execution: the gesture, which helps to create the movement on the canvas, is very important and must be liberated. It translates the energy which the artist draws from the subject. In my view, this is part of the path to the personal interpretation in the subject.
I draw my inspiration in the works of realist as well as abstract painters. My influences go from the Fauves, Expressionists, Group of the Seven and Tom Thompson, Léo Ayotte, Marc Aurèle Fortin, to the contemporary artists like Piet Mondrian, Mark Rothko, Richard Diebenkorn and Franz Kline.
If the artist is successful in translating the inner emotion, it will allow for the creation of a unique, personal work and it will be felt by the observer. Once the painting is completed, there is nothing more to say: it is the canvas that speaks.
