![]() ![]() But when this happens, the satisfaction in what comes out of the process can be so great…beyond words! We really point as much attention as possible back at the artists publicly. Some layers of ego have to be shed by artists for this thing to work. But it’s a part of the experiment that I’m very intrigued by…this whole dialogue between people is remarkable! This is rare mind you, but when it happens, and it does, it can be tricky. Occasionally, you get an artist that really doesn’t vibe with the project for whatever reason…they get very offended by having others touch their work for example…it’s tough to let go sometimes. Sometimes the public doesn’t get the message- we need to stand up and educate, not cave in and criticise ignorance. It’s pretty f’n hard to get by in life solely on your own steam! We, as artists, especially in this day and age of changing artistic/economic tides, need to make solid efforts towards supporting each other and strengthening our communities, which also means reaching out to our public in order to actively engage them in meaningful conversation. The networks we’ve built through working together have been incredible and lasting. The monochrome palette allows artists from very different stylistic and technical practices to mesh together in a harmonious ‘whole’. The limited palette of black and white was born from the personal work of Tim and I, which has lived for year on those notes. When working on projects music is always played and really sets rhythm to the progression. The process has often been compared to Jazz in its spontaneity and free form expression. My hand is everywhere but mainly in support of the piece compositionally, in pattern and line quality, making some pieces stand out and others fall back. I work a lot of these things and often when asked which are my works on a wall, I struggle to show a good answer. When it comes to the drawing itself, I often feel my role to be that of the bass player- keeping the rhythm section tight. Unicorn Blood and Powdered Dreams of Children. It comes from French and means: “as a whole”, or “all together”. “EN MASSE” is a great expression, having the same meaning in both French and English (a great thing in MTL!). The project draws life from the many artists who take part in the project to explore the creation of collective vision works greater than any one person could create on their own. This is a profoundly simple beast in essence, but powerful in process. The concept has changed very little since the beginning. Two minutes later, thinking this was one of the dumbest ideas we’d ever had, we stumbled upon the idea of covering the walls of the gallery in paper or canvas and inviting these same cats (28 in total) to the space for an enormous experimental black and white free-form jam. ![]() ![]() We’d been given carte blanche in this beautiful Old Port Montreal space, and decided it would be interesting to create a salon style exhibition, showcasing the work of many local artists we knew at the time who had little if any gallery exposure or representation. Tim Barnard and myself originally created the En Masse project in 2009 at the Galerie Pangee, Montreal. ![]() Property owners are begging En Masse for a cacophony of chaos to tattoo their walls and we wanted to hear from the conductor of chaos himself: Jason Botkin. Imagine if the doors of perception had been blown off their hinges and you were staring down the rabbit hole into a vortex of monochromatic images swirling out of control. En Masse murals are a writhing mass of bold lines depicting a metamorphic world of Pop Surrealism. En Masse is a collaboration of over 200+ artists from all over the world based in Montreal, Canada, united by simply one maxim: the art has to be black and white. ![]()
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