by Susan Hart

Thanks to a Faculty Teaching Development Grant, Concordia’s Art History Department has recently started production of a one-hour video about Quebec painter Ozias Leduc (1864-1955).

This video represents the pilot for a proposed series of 13 videos covering various artists and aspects of painting in Quebec. The series will be used to enhance the dissemination of Canadian art history at Concordia in the classroom, through distance learning as a telecourse over the educational network Canal-Savoir, and through online Web delivery.

Narrator of the video and principal investigator for the project is François-Marc Gagnon, chair of the Gail and Stephen A. Jarislowsky Institute for Studies in Canadian Art and professor of art history at Concordia.

Dr. Gagnon is internationally recognized for his scholarship; he is a prolific researcher, and author of numerous monographs and exhibition catalogues. He is also a dynamic and inspiring lecturer, and well known in Quebec for his many television appearances. The local press in Shawinigan took the opportunity to photograph and interview him during a break in the recent video shoot.

The first on-location shoot took place at the site of Leduc’s last major project, the interior decoration of Eglise Notre-Dame-de-la Présentation in Shawinigan-Sud. Future shooting will take place where Leduc was born and where he kept his studio: Mont St. Hilaire. This richly scenic mountain provided the inspiration for many of Leduc’s works, now in major museums such as the National Gallery in Ottawa and the Montreal Museum of Fine Art.

Concordia’s Department of Instructional and Information Technology Services is contributing significantly to the project through the use of its facilities and equipment, and through the support and expertise of Michael Keeffe and Peter Blyszczak, of the Open and Distance Learning Office.