A notable figure in contemporary Canadian art, Marcel Barbeau produced an impressive body of more than 4,000 works spanning seven decades. Intersecting several significant periods in the history of recent art, his output provides an overview as singular as it is insightful.

Barbeau was at the forefront of numerous avant-garde movements and artistic trends in Canada. He was a leading contributor to the first stirrings of Abstract painting (1940s and 1950s), was renowed internationally for his contribution to OpArt (1960s), and participated in the first generation of transdisciplinary art in Québec (1970s). Even though his work is rigorous and inspiring, there has never been an exhaustive examination that brings the aesthetic engagement of his output fully into focus. The Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec intends to remedy this through a retrospective exhibition, hence this request for your involvement as an institutional partner.

This major exhibition, the most ambitious ever dedicated to the artist, encompasses his entire career, from the late 1940s to his last work (2015). It will shed light on the pivotal periods of his artistic journey and the diverse influences and sources of inspiration absorbed by his work, ultimately with a view to a careful and fresh look at his body of work, about which relatively little is known despite its significance.