The Louis-Riel sculpture by Miguel Joyal presently located at 450 Broadway Avenue facing the Assiniboine River

Assiniboine River

The Assiniboine River is a river that runs through the prairies of Western Canada in Saskatchewan and Manitoba. It is a tributary of the Red River. The Assiniboine is a typical meandering river with a single main channel embanked within a flat, shallow valley in some places and a steep valley in...

 on the grounds of the Manitoba Legislative Building

Manitoba Legislative Building

The Manitoba Legislative Building is the meeting place of the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba, in central Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. It was originally named the Manitoba Parliament Building, not Legislative. The neoclassical building was completed in 1920 and stands seventy-seven meters tall...

, was unveiled on May 12, 1996 at precisely two thirty in the afternoon. This statue of Riel was executed by Winnipeg born Miguel Joyal

Miguel Joyal

Miguel Joyal is a Canadian sculptor who lives in Winnipeg.He created the bronze statue of Canadian Métis leader Louis Riel at the Manitoba Legislative Building , but he has also created sculptures from snow for Winnipeg's annual winter Festival du Voyageur and even from Styrofoam.Works-References:...

 who has been sculpting since 1979. He completed his apprenticeship in Saint-Jean-Port-Joli, Québec

Quebec

Quebec or is a province in east-central Canada. It is the only Canadian province with a predominantly French-speaking population and the only one whose sole official language is French at the provincial level....

, with Roger-André Bourgeault and sculpts other materials such as wood, stone and snow. The history surrounding Louis Riel

Louis Riel

Louis David Riel was a Canadian politician, a founder of the province of Manitoba, and a political and spiritual leader of the Métis people of the Canadian prairies. He led two resistance movements against the Canadian government and its first post-Confederation Prime Minister, Sir John A....

 as a figure of Métis resistance in both Manitoba

Manitoba

Manitoba is a Canadian prairie province with an area of . The province has over 110,000 lakes and has a largely continental climate because of its flat topography. Agriculture, mostly concentrated in the fertile southern and western parts of the province, is vital to the province's economy; other...

 and Saskatchewan, the communal need for his remembrance as well as the construction of the monument itself all constitute a part of this sculpture’s design.

The stages of construction (as described by sculptor Miguel Joyal)

In April 1995 the maquette

Maquette

A maquette is a small scale model or rough draft of an unfinished architectural work or a sculpture...

 of Riel was conceived in approximately two weeks. Once accepted and officially announced as the winning model on May 3, 1995 the bronze construction took place in Toronto

Toronto

Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...

 at the MST Bronze Limited Art Foundry.

The first step was to mount the steel

Steel

Steel is an alloy that consists mostly of iron and has a carbon content between 0.2% and 2.1% by weight, depending on the grade. Carbon is the most common alloying material for iron, but various other alloying elements are used, such as manganese, chromium, vanadium, and tungsten...

 armature by welding together the dominant elements of the composition (legs, arms, head). The armature was fastened to a portable base with wheels and surrounding it a wooden structure (roof and ramps) was installed allowing the sculptor to easily access the various sections.

Afterwards, two blocks of XPS foam measuring two feet by four feet and eight feet in height were glued to the ‘legs’ of the armature. Smaller pieces of foam were added to envelop the remaining framework

Scaffolding

Scaffolding is a temporary structure used to support people and material in the construction or repair of buildings and other large structures. It is usually a modular system of metal pipes or tubes, although it can be from other materials...

. In order to respect the proposed proportions Joyal proceeded to divide the maquette as well as the foam frame into five equal parts (vertically and horizontally) so that one inch of the maquette would represent one foot of the final sculpture. Various types of saws were used to carve Riel’s figure. On October 26, 1995 winterstone, a type of plaster

Plaster

Plaster is a building material used for coating walls and ceilings. Plaster starts as a dry powder similar to mortar or cement and like those materials it is mixed with water to form a paste which liberates heat and then hardens. Unlike mortar and cement, plaster remains quite soft after setting,...

, was applied to the carving.

Due to the large size of the sculpture (16 feet 8½ inches) the lost-wax casting method was not used. Instead, the statue was divided into ten sections. A mold for each of these segments was produced using the sand casting method (sand mixed with epoxy forms to the outer shape of the statue and then hardens creating the mold). Graphite

Graphite

The mineral graphite is one of the allotropes of carbon. It was named by Abraham Gottlob Werner in 1789 from the Ancient Greek γράφω , "to draw/write", for its use in pencils, where it is commonly called lead . Unlike diamond , graphite is an electrical conductor, a semimetal...

 was dusted over the foam to prevent it from adhering to the sand

Sand

Sand is a naturally occurring granular material composed of finely divided rock and mineral particles.The composition of sand is highly variable, depending on the local rock sources and conditions, but the most common constituent of sand in inland continental settings and non-tropical coastal...

 cast. Sand casting requires less welding and repairing at the end of the process.

The inside of each sand cast mold was layered with plasticine

Plasticine

Plasticine, a brand of modelling clay, is a putty-like modelling material made from calcium salts, petroleum jelly and aliphatic acids. The name is a registered trademark of Flair Leisure Products plc...

 (¼ inch thick). The application of graphite to the sand cast and the plasticine prevented the materials from bonding. A second sand cast was made over the plasticine. This process created a void, which would be filled with melted bronze. To avoid the formation of air pockets air vents were installed before pouring the bronze. The bronze

Bronze

Bronze is a metal alloy consisting primarily of copper, usually with tin as the main additive. It is hard and brittle, and it was particularly significant in antiquity, so much so that the Bronze Age was named after the metal...

 sections were welded together and sandblasted (using a wire brush) to clean the sculpture and produce a uniform texture. Lastly, the bronze was coated with a patina

Patina

Patina is a tarnish that forms on the surface of bronze and similar metals ; a sheen on wooden furniture produced by age, wear, and polishing; or any such acquired change of a surface through age and exposure...

 to protect it from the elements of the outdoors.

In a large wooden crate the finished sculpture was transported from Toronto to Winnipeg

Winnipeg

Winnipeg is the capital and largest city of Manitoba, Canada, and is the primary municipality of the Winnipeg Capital Region, with more than half of Manitoba's population. It is located near the longitudinal centre of North America, at the confluence of the Red and Assiniboine Rivers .The name...

 and fastened to its base with the help of epoxy cement and 1¼ inch stainless steel pins. The cement base was previously installed directly onsite. It measures six feet in height and is plated with Manitoba’s very own Tyndall Stone

Tyndall Stone

Tyndall stone is a dolomitic limestone quarried from the Selkirk member of the Ordovician Red River Formation, in the vicinity of Tyndall, Manitoba, Canada. It was first used in 1832 for building Lower Fort Garry, and has since become popular for building purposes throughout Canada and the United...

.

A need for change

The previous statue of Riel located on this same site for twenty-three years, conceived by Marcien Lemay and Étienne Gaboury

Étienne Gaboury

Étienne Gaboury, CM is a Canadian architect from Winnipeg, Manitoba....

, had provoked a certain controversy amongst the Métis

Métis people (Canada)

The Métis are one of the Aboriginal peoples in Canada who trace their descent to mixed First Nations parentage. The term was historically a catch-all describing the offspring of any such union, but within generations the culture syncretised into what is today a distinct aboriginal group, with...

 people of the province. The Métis people did not feel that this first version appropriately depicted, nor did it respect the importance of Riel’s historical role. They wanted Riel to be commemorated in the same fashion as any other political figure.

Joyal chose to dress the subject in attire that corresponds with the photographs of Riel. The artist added the moccasins, the sash

Sash

A sash is a cloth belt used to hold a robe together, and is usually tied about the waist. The Japanese equivalent of a sash, obi, serves to hold a kimono or yukata together. Decorative sashes may pass from the shoulder to the hip rather than around the waist...

, as well as the Manitoba Act

Manitoba Act

The Manitoba Act, originally titled An Act to amend and continue the Act 32 and 33 Victoria, chapter 3; and to establish and provide for the Government of the Province of Manitoba, is an act of the Parliament of Canada that is defined by the Constitution Act, 1982 as forming a part of the...

 in order to shed light on Riel’s ethnic background and his role in the community. The sculpture’s physical position was designed to convey power and leadership.

The emplacement of this statue on government grounds qualifies it as public art

Public art

The term public art properly refers to works of art in any media that have been planned and executed with the specific intention of being sited or staged in the physical public domain, usually outside and accessible to all...

. The new sculpture along with the historical commemorative plates accompanying it tells the story of a people, a province and its founder. The selected location for the monument is consistent with the general area in which many of the historical events surrounding Riel took place and this also helps situate the onlookers.