Where Politics and Art Collide

By: Rachel Marsden, March 2004

It's tough to find two realms that are further apart than those of politics and visual art. Politics is an arena for bloodsport, littered with the shattered dreams and hopes of those who were either too naive, clueless, or thin-skinned to survive. The pace is fast and furious, with news and events changing by the minute, and each day consisting of a slightly condensed version of eternity.

Enter Pierre Bourque of Canada's Bourque Newswatch: the man who, for the past five years, has kept his fingers glued to the political pulse of the nation and the world and hasn't missed a beat. Named as one of the "Top 50 International Players in New Media" by the Online Journalism Review, Bourque is often described as "Canada's Matt Drudge" on account of the up-to-the-second breaking news site he runs at Bourque.com. With an average of 200,000 hits daily, the site has grown since it's January 1998 inception into a must-read for everyone from news and political junkies to politicians and staffers on Parliament Hill. One never knows when the next piece of juicy gossip or hot tip-off will break, but it's a good bet that as soon as it does, Bourque will have it. The site is layed out in much the same way as the Drudge Report--with breaking news at the top of the page and links to various sources and columnists below. It's simple in design and navigation and virtually ad-free. Bourque's site differs from that of Drudge primarily in that it features, first and foremost, news that specifically matters to Canadians. It's like Drudge with a Canadian twist, eh! Featuring red text on a white background, the site is even wrapped in the same colour scheme as the Canadian flag.

Professional and practical, it would impossible for even the most astute visitor to garner any clues or insight into the other life of the site's webmaster: that of an artist. As it turns out, this Internet journalist and pioneer of one of the most modern forms of communication is also a serious practitioner of one of the very oldest. Amongst all the breaking news updates, family responsibilities (45-year old Bourque is married with a 2-year old son), and talk show gigs with CFRA Radio in Ottawa, Canada's innovator of internet journalism is somehow able to transcend an alternate universe to that of news and politics: one of peace and tranquility, where time grinds to a halt, and moments are captured, frozen, and preserved forever.

On his art website--www.pierrebourque.com--Bourque sums up his take on the art/politics paradox with a quote by J.B. Neumann--founder of the New Art Circle: "Art is life ... secure and serene and timeless ... unaging in the turmoil of politics or international affairs ... independent of praise or blame ... it lives when its spirit recreates the mind of its lover." Art has been a passion of Bourque's for decades--ever since he first studied the craft at the Ottawa School of Art in the early 80's. The same man who authored technical publications like"Government Online In Canada: The Internet User's Comprehensive Directory" and "Freenet: Canadian Online Access The Free And Easy Way," also cites as his artistic influences Canada's famous "Group of Seven", Paul Klee, Jean Paul Riopelle, Wassily Kandinsky, Jean-Paul Lemieux, Oscar Bluemmer, Thaw Malin III, Ovid Ward, Stanley Cosgrove, Claude Picher, and his own artist-uncle--R.C. Bourque.

It's about as easy to get totally lost and absorbed in Bourque's oil-on-canvas paintings as one might imagine he did while creating them. The paintings capture real moments--both in nature and indoors, on land and at sea. Bold and vividly-coloured, Bourque's work runs from impressionist to post-impressionist. Bourque's use of colour can't help but elicit a real, visceral reaction--from the chilling whites and blues in pieces like "Towards Oak Bluffs" and "Elizabeth Islands", to the bright red of "Red Flowers" and warm yellow and orange of "Spring Flowers". A piece entitled "Storm Rising" features a striking, crimson sky set against a beautifully textured, turbulent ocean. The "Group of Seven" influence is particularly evident in Bourque's wilderness landscape paintings that are also somewhat remniscent of Claude Monet's work. Like Monet, Bourque succeeds in capturing the momentary effects of colour and light in pieces like "Solitary Boat" and "Island House".

Canada's Internet guru has, of course, already staked out a corner of cyberspace for his artwork. Bourque's extensive collection can be viewed, and even purchased, online at www.pierrebourque.com. He is represented by the David Butler Gallery in Edgartown, Massachusetts, with his next public exhibition scheduled for the Chilmark Public Library in Martha's Vineyard, MA, from May 29 to June 19th. Galleries wishing to feature Bourque's work are welcome to contact him through his website.