About —
Les Impatients is an organization for promoting the creation and dissemination of outsider, marginal, and folk art whose main mission is to help people with mental health problems through artistic expression. The organization welcomes more than 850 participants a week in 20 service centres throughout Quebec, one of which is located right here, at the heart of the Musée d’art de Joliette (MAJ).
The pieces exhibited in Constellation exhibition present the authenticity, the aesthetic originality, and all the anthropological, sociological, and heritage potential that characterizes the Impatients collection itself. These portraits, houses, and abstractions also provide a glimpse into the diversity of unique universes that arise in both the workshops and the collection.
The Impatients have given workshops at the Musée d’art de Joliette since 2015, with the support of the Fondation de la Santé du Nord de Lanaudière and of the Lanaudière CISSS (Centre intégré de santé et de services sociaux). The talent and sensibility of the participants add a special touch of colour to life at the MAJ and leave a significant mark of their presence. In fact, they are inviting the visitor to leave his or her own mark, along with theirs, as part of a participatory group work.
Les Impatients also possesses a collection of works exclusively related to the notion of mental health. A pioneer of its field in Canada and among the most important collections of its kind in North America, the collection brings together over 15,000 works produced by 150 Impatients creators over the last 30 years, as well as various gifts and acquisitions from outsider art collectors.
Artists
Ugo Beaudoin-Perreault / François Ducas / Roger Duval / Daniel Huot / Michel Laplante / Philippe Lemaire / Antonio Mazza / Frank Merulla / Dinh Duong Nguyen / Etienne O’Leary / Romain Peuvion / Jean-Marc Poissant / Guy Richard / Audrey Taylor / Louis Valentine / Larry Vick
Images in the banner:
Constellation, by Les Impatients, views from the exhibition at the Musée d’art de Joliette, 2021. Photos: Romain Guilbault