This summer, René Lévesque would have been 100 years old. Until August 24, anniversary date, The duty highlights on all its platforms the memory of the founder of the Parti Québécois and one of the greatest prime ministers in history.
Several popular artists have seen in René Lévesque, over time, an essential subject. And it continues, against all odds. Sculptor and painter, settled in the Laurentians for several years, Joy Berkson recently produced a René Lévesque of her own, like many other artists before her.
“When I was little, in Montreal, we just learned English at school,” says Ms.me Berkson to explain her French, which she considers laborious, although she speaks it very well. The French language, she learned it late, she regrets. On the side of France rather than in his own hometown. “I started learning French when I was only 26, when I worked for Club Med! There, I had taken the French accent! When I came back to Montreal, I tried to change that accent…”
Isn’t it surprising that an Anglo-Montrealer was passionate about René Lévesque, to the point of spending hours trying to represent him? “When I choose a subject to sculpt, it has to be someone I’m passionate about, because I spend so many hours perfecting the representation. I could never spend so much time on a character that I don’t respect and admire. »
His very colorful, somewhat cartoonish René Lévesque was made with bandages soaked in the same plaster used in the past to immobilize broken bones. Once dried, the whole is painted with acrylics, enhanced with fabrics. “The mayor of Estérel, Frank Pappas, asked me to buy my “Petit René”. He gets it back this week. »
Joy Berkson has already tackled the task of rendering in her own way, using the same process, personalities such as Pope Francis, Leonard Cohen or Howie Mandel. However, isn’t it a bit unexpected for an Anglo-Montrealer to spend hours representing René Lévesque? ” But no ! I grew up in his time! I have always had the greatest respect for him as a politician. He was passionate and he was fair. He brought about significant changes in Quebec and he did not marginalize immigrants, minorities, who also bring a rich history to our Quebec. »
The artist François-Xavier Cloutier, for his part, offers sculptures and pastels on his website. Alongside representations of radio and television host Jean-Pierre Coallier and mayor Jean Drapeau, there is a bust of René Lévesque. For 32 years, Mr. Cloutier was an assistant in fine arts at Concordia University.
In fact, a simple visit to various classified ad sites reveals a number of commemorative objects dedicated to enhancing the memory of René Lévesque. There are, among other things, busts “in full plaster of Paris” of the statesman, cigarette in beak, “with his casual look from the 1976 era”, specifies for example a seller.
A multitude of representations
Since the 1970s, representations of René Lévesque have been legion. From 1972, several specimens of dollars minted with his effigy appeared. These coins, often in paper, sometimes in metal, are not legal tender. However, the “piasse à Lévesque” reflects an issue, monetary sovereignty, which his party will often face.
On the obverse side of one of these coins, dated 1992, Lévesque appears in profile, like a monarch. As a motto, it reads: “A logical rendezvous with history”. On the tail side, there is a representation of Manic 5, symbol of hydroelectric power to which René Lévesque is often referred, responsible for the nationalization of private hydroelectric companies when he was a minister in the government of Jean Lesage.
In the same logic, imitation passports have been produced. The image of Lévesque is associated with it. But that’s not all. Far from there. There are also René Lévesque buttons, pins and medallions. Not to mention René Lévesque t-shirts, bags, caps, posters and mugs.
In fact, the supports flanked by his effigy are almost endless. “I think the most unusual thing I’ve seen related to Mr. Lévesque is a candle molded in the shape of his face,” says former PQ MP and collector Dave Turcotte.
A tradition ?
Lévesque was not the first Quebec statesman—and probably not the last—whose image was to become an object of popular worship. Autonomist Prime Minister Honoré Mercier was the subject of several representations, as was Maurice Duplessis, the two men having in common having put the banner of “provincial autonomy” at the head of the procession of their ideas.
Of the Quebec politicians, it was undoubtedly Wilfrid Laurier, Liberal Prime Minister of Canada from 1896 to 1911, who was most often represented in all possible and imaginable forms: cigar, clock, pipe, calendar, pens, cups, etc.
The forms of political adulation to which such production testifies are in evolution. Thus we have seen circulating, on social networks, a photograph of an ardent admirer of François Legault who, on his forearm, has had his face tattooed. Faced with the expression of this devotion to him, the head of the CAQ seemed as surprised as he was delighted.
Lévesque, a unique case
Former MP Dave Turcotte is the creator, on the Web, of the Virtual Museum of Political History of Quebec. “While waiting to one day have a real museum dedicated to Quebec’s political heritage, I promote it in this way. Among the innumerable objects that he owns or that he has been able to see dedicated to Canadian prime ministers, the case of Lévesque appears to him to be almost unique.
“In popular art, it’s almost infinite, the representations of Mr. Lévesque. 35 years after his death, it still happens. On August 24, in Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, for example, I was invited to inaugurate a commemorative painting dedicated to Mr. Lévesque. »
There is also a René-Lévesque medal, the highest distinction awarded by the Mouvement national des Québécoises and Québécois. It was given to Bernard Landry, posthumously, in 2019.
“Duplessis saw a few objects commemorating him after his death, but nothing comparable” to René Lévesque, explains collector Dave Turcotte. “Even on the scale of Canada — of which I am not a specialist in political heritage — I think that Lévesque constitutes a special case. In the case of René Lévesque, in any case, it is almost infinite everything that has been devoted to him post mortem. »
Who else, wonders aloud the ex-deputy, has seen so many television series, documentaries or fictions, at the same time as medallions, vinyl records, DVDs, VHS, commemorative posters, t-shirts, key chains, pins, buttons, medals, canvases?