Rita Letendre

Tristesse
Oil on canvas, 1963
80 x 100 cm, 31.5 x 39.5 in.

Availability: Sold.
Biography:

Born in Drummondville in 1928 to a Quebecois mother and a father of Aboriginal origin, the eldest of a family of seven children. In 1941, she followed her parents to Montreal and took care of her brothers and sisters before working as a waitress. Starting, at the age of 19, studied at the Montreal School of Fine Arts. Close friends with Paul-Emile Borduas and the automatiste group. The
exhibition La matiere chante in 1954, was a turning point for Letendre; it made her known in the art world and she went on to become one of Canadas most important abstract painters. Rita's first husband was Montreal sculptor Ulysse Comtois and her second husband was also a sculptor, Israeli Kosso Eloul.  
Rita received the Order of Canada in 2005 and was awarded the Governor General's Awards in Visual and Media Arts this year.

Exhibitions:

1952-53 Groupe Automatiste, Montreal
1954 La Matiere Chante, Montreal
1955 Espace 55, Montreal, L Echourie, Montreal
1956 Galerie L Actuelle, Montreal
1957 Parma Gallery, NYC
1959 Aspects of Canadian Painting, NYC; Galerie Denyse Delrue, Montreal
1961 Musee des Beaux-Arts, Montreal
1963 Tate Gallery, London
1964 Galerie Arnaud, Paris
1966 Agnes Lefort, Montreal
1970 RCA, National Art Gallery of Canada, Ottawa
1973 Musee du Quebec, PQ; Centre Culturel Canadien, Paris
1989 Concordia Art Gallery
1992 National Gallery of Canada, travelling exhibition.
2003 Musee du Quebec, PQ

Collections:

The National Art Gallery of Canada, Ottawa
Museum of Contemporary Art, Montreal
Musee des Beaux-Arts, Montreal
Musee du Quebec, PQ
Musee d art de Joliette, PQ
Art Gallery of Vancouver
Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto
Carleton University, Ottawa
Royal Bank of Canada, Toronto
Long Beach Museum of Fine Arts, California
Embassy of Canada, Rio de Janeiro

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Copyright 2010 Lynda M. Shearer