Pierre Lapointe creates the soundtrack for the exhibition Nicolas Party: L'heure mauve

This February, the multi-talented singer-songwriter-composer Pierre Lapointe will release L’heure mauve, a new album made to accompany the presentation of the exhibition Nicolas Party: L’heure mauve (Mauve Twilight) at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (MMFA). At the Museum’s invitation, he composed a soundtrack that combines new pieces with novel renditions of classics.

Fourteen songs were chosen and written by the Quebec musician for the exhibition and its accompanying catalogue. This music will enhance the public’s experience of the immersive major exhibition on view from February 12 to October 16, 2022. The album will be available on all digital music services and on vinyl later this summer via Bonsound.

In L’heure mauve (Mauve Twilight), Swiss artist Nicolas Party proposes a poetic meditation on nature’s representation in art across the centuries. From one gallery to the next, he creates a dialogue between his vibrant works and those of European and Canadian painters in the MMFA’s collection. It is in this same spirit of connectivity that Pierre Lapointe thematically set to song each of the galleries that make up the exhibition.

Structured in seven themes, the album contains original creations and revisits works by masters of song from Quebec and abroad – from Félix Leclerc to Kurt Weill. Gracefully navigating the depths of our soul, these pieces by Pierre Lapointe explore through exquisite poetry some of the artist’s favourite themes: the ephemeral nature of existence, heartbreak and carnal desire. The overall feel is wistful, pierced by sparks of light.

Produced by Philippe Brault, the album’s sounds combine piano, guitars, percussion and voice. Some of the titles – in which the Molinari Quartet notably participated – integrate beguiling arrangements composed of choral music, strings and wind instruments.

About Pierre Lapointe
In less than two decades, singer-songwriter-composer Pierre Lapointe has become a major figure in the Francophone music scene with his pop songs punctuated by orchestral arrangements. Since his victory at the Festival international de la chanson de Granby in 2001, he has made a dozen albums, including La forêt des mal-aimés (2006), La science du cœur (2017) and Chansons hivernales (2020). He has also collaborated prolifically with Albin de la Simone, Hubert Lenoir, Clara Luciani, Mika, Jean-Willy Kunz and Yannick Nézet-Séguin, among others. Passionate about the visual arts, he oversaw the artistic direction of several of his music videos and shows, and has been involved in collaborations with contemporary artists, such as David Altmejd, BGL, Sophie Calle, Dominique Pétrin and Yann Pocreau. In 2011-2012, he notably presented an installation at the MMFA as part of the exhibition Big Bang: Creativity Is Given Carte Blanche, together with architect Jean Verville.

Nicolas Party : L’heure mauve
On view at the MMFA from February 12 to October 16, 2022, the exhibition Nicolas Party : L’heure mauve (Mauve Twilight) brings together sculptures, paintings – executed mainly in pastels – and large-scale murals, which the artist realized in situ. The landscapes, portraits and still lifes, at once fantastical and subtle, illustrate the complex and often inextricable ties that bind humans to nature. Combining figurative and Surrealist genres, the artist’s creations are set against some 50 works from the Museum’s vast collection that span four centuries. Through over 100 artworks, Nicolas Party – director, exhibition designer and visual artist – presents an exhibition that asks some of our era’s most pressing questions, those of a planet that has reached its twilight, its “heure mauve.”

Credits
Organized by the MMFA, the exhibition Nicolas Party: L’heure mauve is set to song by Pierre Lapointe. It is curated by Nicolas Party, in collaboration with Stéphane Aquin, Director of the MMFA, and Mary-Dailey Desmarais, Chief Curator of the MMFA.

About the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts
Founded in 1860, the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (MMFA) is the oldest art museum in Canada and a leading museum in North America. Its collection showcases Quebec and Canadian heritage and international art from a critical and intercultural perspective, and comprises some 45,000 paintings, sculptures, graphic art works, photographs, multimedia installations and decorative art objects dating from antiquity to the present. The MMFA’s exhibitions span every discipline from archaeology to fine arts, to contemporary practices. Laid out over five interconnecting pavilions, the Museum complex includes over 80 exhibition galleries, the Bourgie concert hall, an auditorium and movie theatre, the Boutique and Bookstore, an in-house publishing department, a public sculpture garden and the Michel de la Chenelière International Atelier for Education and Art Therapy. A pioneering museum in the provision of art therapy, the MMFA works with the community, education, health and technology sectors to give all people exposure to art through inclusive and enriching experiences. mbam.qc.ca

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