At the gallery Espace Robert Poulin this month, an entire show has been dedicated to Guy Boutin, a compelling artist who has made a name for himself in the world of comic art and who is now crossing over into the mainstream arena.

For the past thirty years Guy Boutin has successfully redefined the essence of strong visuals through a foray of blazing colours, and has transformed the use of irreverent lines, marks, squiggles and stars into an individual idiom of expression.

As a comic artist, Boutin borrows heavily from street art and in particular graffiti art which is pervasive in his paintings. For those unfamiliar the artist’s work in both comic books and canvas this show at Espace Robert Poulin will definitely break that barrier and bring him accolades for his creations. In this current show, the artist has made use of a punchy combination of Keith Harring and Basquiat to study the human form, in particular the face in a contortion of varied perspectives. One can also appreciate Boutin’s use of cardboard in unusual shapes to replace the usual artist’s canvas which adds a certain three dimensional quality to his work which is both aesthetically pleasing and evocative.

Working with brushes and acrylic paint Boutin presents a series of faces with exaggerated facial features and additional lines and marks that act as soundtrack to the picture in questions. The running theme in these facial snapshots is the crazed expressions of the subject. In some of his larger pieces, the eyes are wild as they shoot out stars and beams of energy at the viewer. Then there are the large, widely spaced teeth with barely a trace of lips that stretch across the face from ear to ear…one can almost hear the cackling going on.

I can’t help but think that this is a visual expression of an LSD induced reaction and how the subject would see themselves if they were to look into the mirror at the peak of their ‘trip’.  Much of the stars and squiggles that permeate some of the portraits would seem to be the subconscious illusions that would be part of such an experience.

In some of the other portraits, Boutin still plays with dilated features but the shapes are much more recognizable. On one wall of the gallery there is a collection of three small canvases of faces drawn with simple lines of colour that are less saturated in colour in comparison to his larger works. The colours are still brilliant in tone but the expression is calmer and amusing in appearance.

Juxtaposed to these little canvases, Boutin has presented a number of paintings exploring the female form. There is a large canvas positioned alongside three smaller canvases of what Boutin has deemed as his “modèle de l’artist”. Whereas in his other painting the brush strokes are thick with colour and cover the entire canvas, in this study of the female form, the brush strokes are much wider apart interspersed with wavy lines and various dots. The eye is invited to blend these colours into a neo-expressionist representation of beauty.

This latest show is getting a lot of buzz from the local media and rightly so as this creative effort by Guy Boutin represents a dazzling display of talent.

Espace Robert Poulin, space 411
Guy Boutin
November 17 – December 15, 2012
www.espacerobertpoulin.com