Joanne Gervais Visual Artist
Joanne Gervais’ artwork ranges from classical to contemporary abstraction. She is well known for her sensitive portraiture, most of which are created live at special events. Other famed works include her charming Joie De Vivre French Canadian brightly coloured oils depicting children at play with adults still young at heart.
Joanne has had many varied experiences in her life which all culminated in 1994 when she decided to focus on a fine art career. The previous years of education, training, and work in the Fine Crafts which included textiles, pottery, metalsmithing, silkscreen and graphic arts, fashion design. In addition she studied laboratory science, physical education and anatomy, and received Teacher Certification in the Vocational arts. All added up to a very solid foundation for a career in the Fine Arts.
Joanne was substantially involved in sports as an athlete, referee, coach and trainer in soccer, hockey, baseball, volleyball, broomball. It was sports related injuries that necessitated a career change and that led to the fine arts.
Joanne registered as a fine artist in 1996 and has been very productive since with over 8000 artworks and hundreds of graphic designs to her credit. The sports background motivated a series of sports theme artworks which included baseball, curling, hockey, figure skating, skiing, soccer, ringette, BMX, basketball, golf etc.
Joanne has trained in the all important life drawing ateliers for over 40 years. Working with the live model for so long helped solidify her artistic skills and also encouraged experimentation in both media and style. It added an organic and free flowing style to her portraits as well as her non figurative works including the cityscapes landmarks series. Joanne is known for her audacity in tackling new and diverse subjects, her impressive live sketching at music festivals, court trials, conferences, summits, etc, her gentle touch with a portrait, and her bravado when creating an abstract work.