You can’t pigeonhole Michel Lemieux.
He is a composer, creator, performer, screenwriter, director, editor, and so on… Even calling him a multidisciplinary artist seems like an understatement.
It is synonymous with creativity.
Over the years, Michel Lemieux’s impact on his (multi)disciplinary field has been recognized, appreciated, and highlighted. In 2012, he was appointed an Officer of the Order of Canada. In 2014, he was honored with the title of Knight of the Order of Quebec. In 2018, he was also made a Knight of the Order of Montreal.
And on May 28 at Dalhousie Station in Montreal, he will receive a NUMIX award recognizing his exceptional contribution as a pioneer in the digital creativity industry.
Let’s retrace this artist’s journey through a fourth dimension marked by seven significant dates.
1984: A Solide Salad for an Appetizer
In 1984, Michel Lemieux took the stage alone at the Spectrum to present a musical tour de force: Solide Salad.
To create this New Wave show, which follows in the footsteps of his previous performances—namely Le tympan de la cantatrice and L’Oeil rechargeable— he was able to count on the help of director René Richard Cyr (whom he met at the National Theater School) and the“watchful eye”of Édouard Lock (for whom he composed the music for the production *Businessman in the Process of Becoming an Angel by the troupe that would later be named La La La Human Steps).
“Innovation, originality, and the use of technology for artistic purposes— Solide Salad marks a turning point in Quebec and, above all, showcases the talent of Quebec artists far beyond the Belle Province,” notes Denis-Daniel Boullé.
1990: 2×2 = 4D Art
It’s twice as good when there are two of us.
In 1990, Victor Pilon and Michel Lemieux joined forces to form Lemieux Pilon 4D Art.
“Victor had already been working in the visual arts for some time when we met. I myself had a background in theater; our interests and skills complemented each other so well that we started working together quite naturally,” explains Michel Lemieux. “Vic specializes more in elements related to space, such as artistic direction and visual arts, while I focus more on elements related to time, like music, editing, and timing, but in reality, we share all aspects of the creative process by mutual agreement.”
As early as 1992, to kick off the celebrations for the city’s 350th anniversary, 4D ART and Richard Blackburn created Les Nuits de Montréal, a grand carnival parade along Saint-Laurent Boulevard.
1,500 extras, 250,000 spectators—a resounding success.
2004: Let the Circus Begin
In 2004, Michel Lemieux and Victor Pilon organized a new celebration. This time, two anniversaries were celebrated at once: the 25th anniversary of the Montreal International Jazz Festival and the 20th anniversary of Cirque du Soleil. 200,000 people attended the festivities on Sainte-Catherine Street.
This first collaboration paved the way for other projects with Cirque du Soleil. In 2006, Michel Lemieux and Victor Pilon directed Delirium, a show that toured arenas around the world in the style of a rock concert.
In 2015, Cirque du Soleil developed a show inspired by the worldof Avatar titled Toruk. Michel Lemieux and Victor Pilon collaborated with James Cameron to bring the adventures of the Na’vi of Pandora from the screen to the stage.
2008: An Opera to Celebrate Quebec City’s 400th Anniversary
The musical genre of opera emerged around the turn of the 1600s… just like the city of Québec! In 2008, to celebrate the capital’s 400th anniversary, a classical version of the rock opera Starmania was developed by Michel Lemieux and Victor Pilon. Starmania Opéra, presented at the Grand Théâtre de Québec, combined the performing arts with augmented set design to create a larger-than-life spectacle.
This innovative production is reminiscent of the one-man show Norman, created the previous year, in 2007, by Michel Lemieux and Victor Pilon. Through projections onto the set, a dancer was transported into the whimsical world of the experimental films by Norman McLaren, the renowned co-founder of the NFB’s animation studio.
2016: I Remember: Cité mémoire
The “Cité mémoire” urban art installation, featuring projections inspired by Montreal’s history on some 20 downtown buildings, has quickly become an iconic feature of the city’s nightlife.
Created in collaboration with playwright Michel Marc Bouchard, this series of some twenty scenes is intended as an invitation—for Montrealers and tourists alike—to explore North America’s largest French-speaking city and immerse themselves in its history, culture, and beauty.
2020: Heading to Cannes on the Wings ofIcarus
Riding on the wings of their mixed-reality project Icare, co-produced with Normal Studio, Michel Lemieux and Victor Pilon are flying off to the prestigious Cannes Film Festival. Presented in the immersive section of the Cannes Film Market, this virtual reality work is an adaptation of the play Icare, which premiered at the Théâtre du Nouveau Monde in 2014.
Michel Lemieux has since directed two other films for immersive platforms: Intouché, a film conceived during the pandemic that explores isolation, and Invisible, a film that tackles the sensitive issue of the marginalization of older adults in our modern world.
“My work explores the intersection between reality and the imagination, always featuring people,” explains Michel Lemieux about his VR works.
2023: Everyone Dances: INSITU Trail
The INSITU experience, conceived by Michel Lemieux, leverages the sense of presence offered by augmented reality to connect the public with iconic artists from 17 Montreal cultural institutions via a mobile app.
One of the highlights of the tour is the INSITU Wall, which allows visitors to record their dance moves and showcase them through larger-than-life projections on the facade of the Maison Symphonique de Montréal.
Thus, 40 years after making his mark on Montreal’s cultural scene with his showLe Tympan de la cantatrice, Michel Lemieux turns the spotlight on the audience and offers them the chance to leave their mark on one of the city’s most important cultural institutions.
The adventure continues!
To this long list of accomplishments, we could have added Continuum, a dome film set to the music of Philip Glass that has been dazzling visitors at the Montreal Planetarium since 2013. Or The Dissolution of Lady Macbeth a digital installation created for Thierry Mugler’s Couturissime exhibition, which has since been seen by 1.5 million people in five museums around the world. And that’s just to name a few!
And at this point, it’s important to note that the NUMIX Tribute Award celebrates the first 45 years of his career. A consummate artist, he remains active and continues to add masterpieces to his portfolio. Oniro, a nighttime sound-and-light experience, is currently on display at Omega Park in the Outaouais region. Vulnérable, an installation exploring compassion, is now touring high schools in the CSSDM district. Not to mention that nine paintings from Cité mémoire continue to be projected in downtown Montreal.
Let’s bet that his boundless imagination still has plenty of surprises in store for us in the years to come.
This text was translated from the original French with the help of DeepL.