About The Author

François-Marc Gagnon

François-Marc Gagnon is the Founding Director and Distinguished Research Fellow of the Gail and Stephen A. Jarislowsky Institute for Studies in Canadian Art. Internationally recognized as an outstanding scholar of Canadian visual culture, Dr. Gagnon is a teacher, researcher, writer, lecturer, and a tireless promoter of the country’s visual heritage. In 1999 he received the Order of Canada. He taught at the Université de Montréal for thirty-five years and was a lecturer in Concordia University’s graduate Art History program. He has received many awards for his writing, including the Governor General’s Award for his 1978 critical biography of Paul-Émile Borduas. This seminal work was published in English in 2013 as Paul-Émile Borduas: A Critical Biography; the text was updated and revised by the author and translated by Peter Feldstein.  

 

Gagnon’s other books include La conversion par l’image: Un aspect de la mission des Jésuites auprès des Indiens du Canada au XVIIe siècle (1975); Paul-Émile Borduas: Ecrits/Writings, 1942–1958 (1978); Paul-Émile Borduas (1988), for the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts; Chronique du mouvement automatiste québécois, 1941–1954 (1998); and The Codex Canadensis and the Writings of Louis Nicolas (2011). His numerous monograph studies span the history of Quebec art, from his book Premiers peintres de la Nouvelle-France (1976) to recent writings on Jean-Paul Riopelle. 

 

He has contributed to numerous books on Quebec visual culture and exhibition catalogues and has curated many exhibitions. He has regular contributed to Journal of Canadian Art History / Annales d’histoire de l’art canadien and is a member of its editorial board, among others. Dr. Gagnon reached the wider community through his television series Introduction à la peinture moderne au Québec for Canal Savoir, and more recently he has presented a series of annual lectures on aspects of Canadian art at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, in conjunction with the Jarislowsky Institute. He has served on various boards of museums and is regularly called upon as a consultant to art and academic institutions.