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Where do you start and where do you finish when an artist such as Louis Philippe Hebert has an exhibition where the catalogue has 400 pages of text.
What I could have done with this book back when I was eagerly seeking information on the early Canadian Sculptor.
I will not try and mention or choose all of his works in a photographic journal such as I have planned right now. After seeing this huge exhibition in Quebec City a couple of years ago I can say I not longer need to seek any more information on his life.
Perhaps you have never tried to biograph a person who has been dead since 1917 after living and working his entire life executing one statue after another not to count the portraits of his family and famous people who commissioned his craft.
Perhaps it would be easy to mention those Public works that are on display throughout Quebec and Ontario and the Maritimes.
When I first started to photograph the memorials that are in Montreal there were few instances when I could not find his works I parks and Museums and art galleries.
J. Russell Harper helped me in the beginning in the visit to Notre Dame in Montreal where two works are there under the pulpit. Walks around town uncovered more pieces attributed to P. Hebert. It surely kept me busy ticking off the list I got from the City hall. It was three pages long and mentions every work known to Quebec Province and City.
Of course I did not get them all finished in one visit and as Mr. Harper said," it would take him five years to do such a search", well it has taken me much more then that to finish what is there.
The Toronto Metropolitan Library helped me out with what information they held in their collection. It did not satisfy me in the least as I got deeper into what constitutes his life and works.
Perhaps the greatest pleasure was the visit to the Cathedral of Ottawa around 1969 when the priest let me photograph the entire interior decorations, statues and memorials. The color slides turned out to be the best I have ever taken and that is going some.
I had thought that a professional photographer would help and take the photos for me at that time. He was famous and of a good reputation but he would not go anywhere near the place. In the exhibition catalogue the photos are out of this world for color and detail. I could not be happier about the results.
Biographing the entire life of an artist is not the same as getting some good photos together and writing a brief biography of them. I strongly recommend that you run out and purchase a copy of this exhibition before it has gone out of print.
When you have exhausted yourself in Montreal and Ottawa go a little further to Quebec City and take in the sights of the works in the niches of the Quebec Parliament buildings. The historic figures he did along with those done by other sculptors will make your eyes cross. Unfortunately there too are no plaques to tell you who did which work.
The work of Hebert you could not miss and still give credit to Laliberte, M.A.Suzor Cote, Henri Hebert, E. Soucy, J. E. Brunet and a few I have no names as to the artist.
My telephoto lens was busy trying to get a close-up of them as they sit perched high in their niches.
If I might go back to the exhibition catalogue and see for the first time his many statuettes he did over the years. These were all new finds for me. They showed me what he had to do to get recognition during his life.
Through the many monuments one learns the history of our country also. How else would I learn about members of our Government, Religious Orders, and brave souls who fought to survive in this wilderness?
I just recently uncovered the story of one of my great great… grandmothers who was half Dutch and Black Slave taken to Montreal and married Mose Dupuis a Coeur de Bois. She was 15 in 1690 and bore ten children before her death. The story goes to say she was purchased for 30 pounds. Born in 1674, Marie Ann Christenzen daughter of Christian Christinzen from Albany New York.
The stories of Frontenac at the age of 74 coming down from Montreal in the middle of winter with 150 men to try and turn the tide of events in the favour of the French. They cut the throats of 67 white and Dutch people but save this mulatto girl.
It is with awe I view the models that Hebert did of such events that happened not so long in his history making figures.
Unfortunately the catalogue is in French and one can miss a lot of needy information about the erection of Queen Victoria, Sir George Etienne Cartier, and Mgr. Laval all along the way.
I want to thank the Quebec Government for going all out for this wonderful exhibit. I went to the five rooms and drowned myself for several hours in enjoying what I was starved to see.
I came home proud of being able to say once and for all I know this man at last.
Quebec would be a very different place if the works that Hebert did never got done. Even the busts in the cemeteries would suffer this loss.
SOME OF HIS PUBLIC WORKS
Maisonneuve Monument, Mtl.
Hon. John Young, Mtl.
Bourget Memorial, Mtl.
Jeanne Mance Memorial, Mtl.
King Edward Monument, Mtl
Buste d'Octave Cremazie St. Louis Square Mtl.
Statue de Salaberry, Chambly
Statue de l'Abbe Pierre-Marie Mignault, Chambly
Madeleine Vercheres, Quebec
Howe Monument, Halifax N.S.
Tilley Monument, St. John New Brunswick
Sir John A. Macdonald Monument, Ottawa
Queen Victoria, Ottawa Ontario
Alexander Mackenzie, Ottawa (also MacCarthy)
Mgr. Laval, Quebec City
Champlain, Quebec Leg. Bldg.
Salaberry, Quebec Leg. Bldg.
Stop in the Forest, Quebec Leg. Bldg.
Picheur, Quebec Leg. Bldg.
Frontenac, Quebec Leg. Bldg.
Montcalm, Quebec Leg. Bldg.
Wolfe, Quebec Leg. Bldg.
Sir Louis-Hyppolite Lafontaine, Quebec Leg, Bldg.
Levis, Quebec Leg. Bldg.
Lord Elgin, Quebec Leg. Bldg.
Religion et Patrie, Quebec Leg. Bldg.
Short Wallick Memorial, Quebec
Boer War Memorial, Calgary
Cathedral de Ottawa, statues (O. Gratton)
Sir John A McDonald Statue
Sir G. E. Cartier Statue
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