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BELIEVING IN DREAMS
At 35, Réal had a dream that changed his outlook on his childhood and the course of his life as a painter. At the time, he was teaching physical education and art to elementary school children. He was also teaching himself to make oil paintings, learning the craft: the nature of canvas, the proclivities of oil paint, the way colours work with and against one another. In the dream, Réal saw himself as a 14 year old boy. The boy gave him a bag to open, it was, he said, full of treasure's for the 35 year old Réal. "I tipped the bag upside down," says Réal, recalling his dream, "and three things fell out on the ground. The first was a small…I told you this was a crazy dream," he laughs before going on, "a green smurf wiggling all around. Then a gold coin and a small book." When he touched the book, it grew large and he opened it. It was full of paintings. He was overcome with emotion, believing he could not do such paintings himself. His 14 year old self said, these are your paintings. They've been done for a long time and now they have to come back to Earth. "The dream was saying it was time for me to start my career as an artist," says Réal. The coin, he said indicated that he would be all right financially. The book was the recognition of his work, indicating he would be successful. "And the smurf guy? That's the best one," he says. "This is the lost part of myself. He meant I would have the child's part of my heart open again, it will come back in my life, I will have the happiness to do my painting." JUST CLOSE YOUR EYES AND PAINT Réal's works are usually large canvases, painted with bold strokes of bright colour, the paint thick and lustrous. Houses, skating rinks, trees, churches, cabins…all bend and move and stretch with an energy that almost can't be contained on a mere canvas. They are the result of what Réal calls "eyes closed" drawing. With eyes closed, he begins by drawing with pencil on the sketch. He waits to be guided by whatever is within that needs to be drawn. He opens his eyes and some of the lines will suggest a house or a tree. He darkens these lines, then closes his eyes and draws again. "And then the last part I do with eyes open," he says. "I add some new lines to finish the subject and I do the painting from that. There is a real childlike joie de vivre about Réal's work. The bright colours, subjects of small town life, tiny scenes of everyday occurrence told with joy and warmth and real human feeling. "And I understand now why I am painting like that. It is like I'm living the life of my childhood again. Because it seems that somewhere it's been locked away. By changing families all the time and being in an orphanage and different places, all this emotion was just growing, growing, just exploding. So from all this imagery I am creating, I'm just seeing myself as a happy child. I never thought I was before." It is, he says, a process of healing. "Inside, I get closer to what the dream is saying - That I will get my happiness from this painting, from the originality, from who I am." Opening his eyes to see what is on the canvas, Réal sees his life. "It is the line that decides where I go." |
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NEW! In the Gallery
