Armand Vaillancourt

Armand Vaillancourt is a major artist of the modernist movement in Québec who played an essential role in the advancement of sculpture in the 1950s and 1960s in Montréal. Although essentially abstract, his works convey a sense of social engagement and were driven by the political demands that he upheld over nearly seven decades. Vaillancourt’s practice belongs to a type of art that is committed to and structured by the development of new values. His works share a common concern for making the most of a material’s intrinsic qualities. These vary considerably depending on the scale of the piece and the artist’s willingness to experiment with new techniques. His work is characterized by its rawness and the use of industrial materials. Vaillancourt is also known for the public nature of his work, whether through performances, the live-casting of sculptures, or its integration in architecture as part of public commissions in Québec, Canada, and abroad. One of his best-known works is Vaillancourt Fountain (1971), also called “Québec libre!,” a monumental Brutalist fountain located in San Francisco’s Plaza Embarcadero.