A brand new database, Rappels, contains information on approximately 6,200 Quebec theater productions from the last 75 years. When its founder Pierre MacDuff was interviewed recently, on the subject of the most cited champion, artist or craftsman in this very rich place of memory of national scenes, he without hesitation named the makeup artist Angelo Barsetti.
“There have been hundreds and hundreds of productions, and still, we don’t have all of their participations,” said Mr. MacDuff, himself a pillar of the sector. We have what we have dealt with and we have not yet treated everything. »
The statistics, even incomplete, concerning Angelo Barsetti are dizzying. The account consulted at the beginning of September offers 372 mentions, or 6% of digital banking.
Mr. Barsetti has worked on 173 Quebec plays and 150 creations. He touched on all genres (even puppet theater…) and produced productions for all ages, including five for early childhood. He received 22 awards from the TNM, 8 from the Association québécoise des critiques and 6 from the Académie québécoise du théâtre. However, his name remains very, very largely unknown to the public.
The champion in all categories also confirms it without false modesty or boasting: these impressive accounts indeed turn out to be incomplete. Missing are his numerous makeup contracts for dance or cinema, photographer work for show posters (that of Sweaty hands presented recently is by him) and probably some creations of costume designer or hairdresser for the stage.
“I started writing my CV for scholarship applications, and then I got tired,” says Mr. Barsetti with a laugh. The meeting takes place in a former bolt factory in Rosemont, Montreal, which he himself renovated around twenty years ago to turn it into a magnificent artist’s loft. “I didn’t get to the end, but I should finish the list. Basically, I’d say I’ve worked on over 500 shows, maybe even close to 600. That’s actually a lot in 35 years of career. »
Barsetti & grandson
Angelo Barsetti was born in Quebec in 1957. He bears the sweet first name of his grandfather who emigrated from Italy, a specialist in gilding, founder of Barsetti & Frères, a famous manufacturer of religious statues. Louis, his father, worked as a molder in the company that became Barsetti & Manucci. Business was going well in Catholic Tibet until the Second Vatican Council advocated an almost Protestant sobriety for the decoration of Catholic churches and the Quiet Revolution emptied them of their faithful. The Barsetti house closed its doors in 1965 and threw its workshop base of some 300 statues into the landfill.
Son Barsetti’s vocation for makeup began by chance. He was studying visual arts when a friend dragged him to the Trident theater to draw the actors. It was the first time he attended a theatrical performance.
“I remember it was Twelfth Night, with Dorothée Berryman and Normand Chouinard. » The production dates from January 1975, directed by André Brassard according to Rappels. “We went backstage, into the dressing rooms. I was leaning against the sink when makeup artist Yvan Gaudin asked me to wash his brushes. It’s crazy, but it’s like he put my tools in my hands. Now I’m a painter and I think I’m going to wash my brushes for the rest of my life. »
He then moved to Montreal, did several small food jobs, danced a little and followed professional training in beauty care and makeup at the Jérôme-Le Royer school for a year. “I was very, very shy. I was blushing on the phone. My only option was to put makeup on the dead. I went to offer my services at Urgel Bourgie. I was 20 years old. I had dressed as an undertaker. Fortunately, it didn’t work because the embalmer himself applied make-up to the bodies. »
His first professional work as a makeup artist for the living came through photography, an art discovered again by a friend. He first did makeup (and photographed) models for a clothing store. He then joined underground film sets (“we were paid in apple pies”). And then, came a first contract at the theater. And all one: the creation of the piece The Feluettes by Michel Marc Bouchard, again directed by André Brassard, but for the National Arts Center in 1987. Angelo Barsetti was thirty years old.
“My name had been suggested by Marc-André Coulombe who was in charge of the costumes and when I was offered this first contract I initially refused it. I didn’t know anything about theater and I had more of a taste for cinema and fashion. It was explained to me that the production was not looking for a theater makeup artist, in fact. Sometimes I think it’s the most beautiful show which I did because of the naivety of the first draft. And the welcome from Brassard was extraordinary. »
After this much appreciated minimalist work, the phone started ringing with offers from the biggest names of what can be described as the golden age of the Quebec scene, from Denis Marleau to Brigitte Haentjens. The prominent craftsman sometimes worked on around twenty productions per year. “I ate in taxis. Some days I would work in three theaters. In the end, I saw the theater I did and very few other productions. I didn’t have time to be a spectator. »
A poetic work
And what to do in the end? “I always avoided doing masks,” the makeup artist responds frankly. I like minimalist, natural work. They came to get me for that. Wajdi Mouawad wrote a text about me saying that I am not a makeup artist, but a makeup remover. He said that I showed what was inside, without ever falling into decoration. It’s the best compliment I’ve received. »
Costume giant François Barbeau also employed him quite a bit as a hairdresser with much the same praise. “He told me that with me my actors didn’t seem like they had just left the living room. I did hypernatural or hypertheatrical hair. »
The poetry of one nourished that of the other. A replica of the play Fires de Mouawad says that “childhood is a knife stuck in the throat”. Angelo Barsetti was inspired to make spots in two shades of red in aqua color on the necks of the characters concerned. “In the dressing rooms, the actors asked for the pot of color saying: “give me my childhood”…”
The first dance contracts came from the company Le Carré des Lombes of Danièle Desnoyers, a choreographer very attentive to fashion. This art has its own constraints related to movements, sweat, ranges, etc. “It’s the first look that counts. Afterwards, it’s even nice to see the first impression undone. »
Quite quickly, the makeup artist requested and obtained to be included at the start of the production creation process. “It’s group work and we have to know where we’re going together,” he says, citing the names of costume designers Isabelle Larivière and Linda Brunelle as other exceptional encounters in the design teams. He specifies that the production For the animal kingdom at Quat’sous (2016) with Mme Brunelle was one of the peaks of exuberance of his career.
“I often struggled with the lighting in the theater. It doesn’t always reveal what I want. You have to deal with oblique lighting, shower light, constraints that I discover when entering the room. Makeup is revealed in front lighting, which is something we avoid in the theater most of the time. So I get more satisfaction from doing makeup for photography than for theater. »
Once he has a good grasp of the direction of a production, Angelo Barsetti sometimes draws inspiration from master paintings. His house is filled with reproductions of his painter’s hand.
I admit that I did stage makeup more for the actors than for the audience. Makeup allows them to do their job, to push them into the light.
He … not sketch not his makeup ideas and goes straight to the faces of the troupe. The actors learn the framework and reproduce it before each performance. “They become excellent,” says the man who also taught his art at the National Theater School of Canada, again under the direction of André Brassard.
“I admit that I did stage makeup more for the actors than for the audience. Makeup allows them to do their job, to push them into the light. We look for the character’s face and all of a sudden, we find it and we see in the eyes of the actors that they see it too. »
The overactive employee warns that he will not add any more. At the age of 66, he stopped this career to devote himself to painting and photography. The exhibition With bringing together his photos (Give body) and those of Jacques Perron (Corpus) will be presented at La Petite Place des arts near Shawinigan in October.
Angelo Barsetti decided five years ago, at age 60, that he would pursue his other passions as an artist. The pandemic encouraged him to “find the door” while delaying his departure by force of postponed calendars and resumptions of shows. The complete Vernon Subutex by Virginie Despentes adapted by Angela Konrad, in May at Usine C, will probably be her last and almost 600e collaboration for the stage. “I love theater. I like what I experienced. I leave this environment fulfilled. »