- Antoine Plamondon
Antoine-Sébastien Plamondon (ca. 1804-1895) was a Canadian artist who painted mainly portraits and religious images in 19th-century Quebec.
Life
Plamondon was born in 1804 (or 1802) at
L'Ancienne-Lorette, Quebec , the son of the village grocer. He went to school in Saint-Roch, a suburb of Quebec City, after which he was apprenticed to Joseph Légaré (1795-1855), a picture restorer and amateur painter. In 1826 Plamondon travelled to Paris where he studied with classical portraitists such as Paulin Guérin (1783-1855). Works from this period are scarce. [R. H. Hubbard, "Antoine Plamondon / 1802-1895, Théophile Hamel / 1817-170. Two Painters of Quebec / Deux Peintres de Québec" (Ottawa: National Gallery of Canada, 1970), pp. 14-15.]In 1830, after the Louis-Philippe uprisings, Plamondon returned to Quebec. While his portraits were of living subjects, many of his religious paintings (commissioned by various churches and religious orders around
Quebec City ) were based on engravings of old masters. His portrait work was notable for his full-face, close-up, and tightly comosed style as well as a concentration on the latest style of clothing. His later portraits showed more roundness in the modelling and far more space in the composition. [Hubbard, pp. 25-29.]By 1850 Plamondon had moved to the country at Neuville, with his mother, a brother, and a sister, where he lived until the 1890s. Much of his work during this period were religious paintings, copies of old masters, done for local churches. [Hubbard, p. 32.]
Plamondon never married. He was a lifelong monarchist and supporter of the Conservative Party, a friend of Sir
George-Étienne Cartier and SirÉtienne Taché , but broke with the Conservatives over the execution ofLouis Riel . His 1882 self-portrait was probably his last work [Hubbard, p. 33.] He died in Neuville in 1895.Gallery
References
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