Valérie Blass facts for kids

Valérie Blass is a Canadian artist born in 1967. She is famous for making amazing sculptures. Valérie lives and works in Montreal, Quebec, where she grew up. She studied art at the Université du Québec à Montréal.

Valérie uses many ways to create her sculptures. She uses methods like casting, carving, and moulding. She also uses bricolage, which means making something new from different things she finds. Her art often mixes everyday objects with new shapes.

People have compared her work to famous artists like Marcel Duchamp. Her sculptures are found in big collections. These include the National Gallery of Canada and the Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal.

How Valérie Blass Creates Art

Valérie Blass has special ways of making her unique sculptures. She often uses ideas like putting things together, making doubles, and showing things that are not quite finished.

Putting Things Together: Collage

Valérie often uses a method called collage in her art. This means she brings different materials together. She picks materials that connect in some way. They might look similar or have a similar idea behind them. By putting them together, she gives them new meaning.

Making Doubles: Doubling

Another idea Valérie uses is doubling. This is when she makes two sculptures that are similar. One might be a bit different or changed. This makes you look closely at how the two objects relate. She might use the same texture for two sculptures. One could look like a person, and the other more abstract.

Showing Unfinished Forms

Valérie's art often challenges the idea of a "perfect" shape. She likes to take things apart and then put them back together. She does this in surprising ways. She doesn't plan everything ahead of time. She lets new ideas happen as she works. This makes her art exciting and unexpected.

Amazing Art Shows

Valérie Blass has shown her sculptures in many important art exhibitions. These are like big shows where people can see her work.

Solo Exhibitions

Here are some places where Valérie had her own art shows:

• 2019: Le parlement des invisibles at the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto.
• 2019: The Mime, the Model and the Dupe at Oakville Galleries.
• 2015: To only ever say one thing forever the same thing at Catriona Jeffries, Vancouver.
• 2015: My Life at Artspeak, Vancouver.
• 2012: A big show at the Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal.
• 2009: An exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art in Toronto.

Group Exhibitions

Valérie's art has also been part of many group shows with other artists:

• 2012: Oh, Canada at MASS MoCA. This was a huge show of Canadian art.
• 2010/2011: It is What it Is at the National Gallery of Canada. This show featured new art bought by the gallery.
• 2009: Nothing to Declare: Current Sculpture from Canada at The Power Plant in Toronto.
• 2008: The first Québec Triennial at the Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal.

In 2015, Valérie showed new sculptures in an exhibition called My Life. These included busts (sculptures of heads and shoulders), mirrors that looked strange, and casts of human body parts.

Awards and Prizes

Valérie Blass has won several important awards for her art:

• 2017: The Gershon Iskowitz Prize. This is a big award given by the Art Gallery of Ontario.
• 2016: The Prix Ozias-Leduc.
• 2012: The Victor Martyn Lynch-Staunton Award for Visual Arts.
• 2010: The Prix Louis-Comtois from the City of Montreal.