sylvain voyer
Sylvain Voyer is an artist born in Edmonton in 1939. Encouraged in early school to paint, he began his foray into the arts by doing landscape studies of Mill Creek Ravine. He studied painting at Alberta College of Art and Design in Calgary from 1959 to 1961. In 1964, he produced a limited-edition book on the environmental effects of urban development entitled: Edmonton Had a Beautiful River Valley. The next few years were spent doing installations and performances across Canada, until 1966 when he moved to Montreal, followed by New York in 1967. During this time, he continued creating many works, including 1967 (the ‘hippy’ painting). In 1970, he returned to Edmonton to teach at the U of A and to run children’s workshops at the AGA. In 1972, he began designing and building playground furniture with staff under a Local Initiatives Program. Later that year, he founded Edmonton’s own Latitude 53, with producer Harry Savage.
In 1973 he became a National Representative for CARFAC and in 1975 he exhibited at what is now the Douglas Udell Gallery. He exhibited his installation Mount Voyer at Latitude 53 in 1977, produced and collaborated on various public commissions throughout the 1980s, and in the early 1990s worked on The Mayan, inspired by archaeological sites in the Yucatan peninsula. He then began painting on the west coast of Mexico until 2006, when he moved to Claresholm, Alberta. He has since been painting the southern landscapes while residing in Edmonton, Alberta.
i speak tree
Stantec Tower – 10220 103 Ave NW
Sylvain Voyer, I Speak Tree, Stantec Tower, Edmonton, AB. Photo by Ashvaria Rai.
ARTIST STATEMENT
I Speak Tree
“A tree is beautiful, but what’s more, it has a right to life; like water, the sun and the stars, it is essential. Life on earth is inconceivable without trees” - Anton Chekov
I Speak Tree is an installation of posters, reproductions of original paintings repurposed as protest art. They are not high art. Artists and poets can be voices for trees, and as Dr. Seuss's The Lorax would say, “I speak for the trees, for the trees have no tongues.”
Using the method of making the folded triangle frames emphasizes the triangle as a symbol for strength. Each poster tells a different story, with different themes and different seasons. Henry David Thoreau says, “Live in each season, drink the drink, taste the fruit.” Animals are our allies, and the trees grow big and tall. Give us sunlight and water and we will help to heal the earth; the trees will clean the air—the forests will grow.
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1967 (the “hippy painting”)
I was living in New York City in the late 1960s, during which time I began 1967 (the “hippy painting”). I was working in a studio on the lower east side, where the rent was $47.50. We were with a cultural revolution, youth, Vietnam, music, drugs, long hair, all this happening in the east village. I wanted to report on a pictorial transformation. 65 years later, the hippies freak out with black light paint.
