Place des Arts
Encyclopedia
- For the teaching arts centre in British Columbia, see Place des Arts (Coquitlam)Place des Arts (Coquitlam)Place des Arts is a non-profit teaching arts centre located in the Maillardville area of Coquitlam, British Columbia.Founded in 1972, the centre offers programs in visual arts, music, drama, dance and creative writing...
.
Place des Arts is a major performing arts centre in Montreal
Montreal
Montreal is a city in Canada. It is the largest city in the province of Quebec, the second-largest city in Canada and the seventh largest in North America...
, Quebec
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....
, Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
.
Located in the eastern part of the city's downtown, between Ste-Catherine and de Maisonneuve Streets, and St-Urbain and Jeanne-Mance streets, in an area now known as the Quartier des Spectacles
Quartier des Spectacles
Quartier des Spectacles is an entertainment district located in the eastern section of Downtown Montreal. The area is currently undergoing gentrification and urban renewal that will turn it into the centre for Montreal's cultural events and festivals....
, the complex is home to the Montreal Symphony Orchestra
Montreal Symphony Orchestra
Orchestre symphonique de Montréal is a symphony orchestra based in Montréal, Québec, Canada, with Montréal's Place des Arts as its home.-History:...
, Les Grands Ballets Canadiens
Les Grands Ballets Canadiens
Les Grands Ballets Canadiens de Montréal is a Canadian ballet company based in Montreal, Quebec.It was founded in 1957 by Ludmilla Chiriaeff. Conductor and composer Michel Perrault served as the organization's first music director. In 2000, Gradimir Pankov became Artistic Director...
, and the Opéra de Montréal
Opéra de Montréal
Opéra de Montréal is an opera company in Montreal. It performs at the Place des Arts theatre complex in downtown Montreal, in the borough of Ville-Marie. It was founded in 1980...
.
Place des Arts was an initiative of Mayor Jean Drapeau
Jean Drapeau
Jean Drapeau, was a Canadian lawyer and politician who served as mayor of Montreal from 1954 to 1957 and 1960 to 1986...
, a noted lover of opera, as part of a project to expand the downtown core eastward from the concentration of business and financial activity in the centre-west part of downtown. The Corporation George-Étienne-Cartier, named in honour of George-Étienne Cartier
George-Étienne Cartier
Sir George-Étienne Cartier, 1st Baronet, PC was a French-Canadian statesman and Father of Confederation.The English spelling of the name, George, instead of Georges, the usual French spelling, is explained by his having been named in honour of King George III....
, a Father of Confederation
Canadian Confederation
Canadian Confederation was the process by which the federal Dominion of Canada was formed on July 1, 1867. On that day, three British colonies were formed into four Canadian provinces...
and opera lover, was set up to build it, and the first part of the complex (including the Salle Wilfrid-Pelletier) was inaugurated on September 21, 1963. The other theatres were added progressively. The Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal
Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal
The Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal is a contemporary art museum in the Place des Arts complex, Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The collection includes over 7,000 works of art by more than 1,500 artists , covering contemporary art in Quebec in particular and Canada in general, as well as...
was added to the complex on May 28, 1992.
Theatres
The Place des Arts includes five theatres of various sizes:- Salle Wilfrid-PelletierSalle Wilfrid-PelletierSalle Wilfrid-Pelletier is a large multipurpose venue in Montréal, Québec equipped with sophisticated technical equipment. It seats 2,982 people and is part of the Place des Arts cultural complex in Montréal's Quartier des Spectacles entertainment district....
- Théâtre Maisonneuve
- Théâtre Jean-Duceppe
- Studio-théâtre
- Cinquième salle
Construction of a new concert hall for the Montreal Symphony Orchestra (Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal) is set to be completed by 2011 at the cost of $105 million (CAD) and will seat approximately 1,900 spectators.
This wealth of theatres permits the staging of opera
Opera
Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...
, symphony
Symphony
A symphony is an extended musical composition in Western classical music, scored almost always for orchestra. A symphony usually contains at least one movement or episode composed according to the sonata principle...
, ballet
Ballet
Ballet is a type of performance dance, that originated in the Italian Renaissance courts of the 15th century, and which was further developed in France and Russia as a concert dance form. The early portions preceded the invention of the proscenium stage and were presented in large chambers with...
and other dance
Dance
Dance is an art form that generally refers to movement of the body, usually rhythmic and to music, used as a form of expression, social interaction or presented in a spiritual or performance setting....
, chamber music
Chamber music
Chamber music is a form of classical music, written for a small group of instruments which traditionally could be accommodated in a palace chamber. Most broadly, it includes any art music that is performed by a small number of performers with one performer to a part...
, choral music, theatre
Theatre
Theatre is a collaborative form of fine art that uses live performers to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place. The performers may communicate this experience to the audience through combinations of gesture, speech, song, music or dance...
, film
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
presentation, and various other presentations and ceremonies.
In addition to the theatres, the complex hosts the Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal
Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal
The Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal is a contemporary art museum in the Place des Arts complex, Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The collection includes over 7,000 works of art by more than 1,500 artists , covering contemporary art in Quebec in particular and Canada in general, as well as...
, a museum of contemporary art
Contemporary art
Contemporary art can be defined variously as art produced at this present point in time or art produced since World War II. The definition of the word contemporary would support the first view, but museums of contemporary art commonly define their collections as consisting of art produced...
, as well as rehearsal halls, shops, services, and a large, popular esplanade decorated with original fountains and water cascades.
All the various facilities are connected by an underground mall, also linked to Place-des-Arts
Place-des-Arts (Montreal Metro)
Place-des-Arts is a station on the Green Line of the Montreal Metro rapid transit system operated by the Société de transport de Montréal . It is downtown in the borough of Ville-Marie, Montreal, Quebec, Canada...
metro
Montreal Metro
The Montreal Metro is a rubber-tired metro system, and the main form of public transportation underground in the city of Montreal, Quebec, Canada....
station
Metro station
A metro station or subway station is a railway station for a rapid transit system, often known by names such as "metro", "underground" and "subway". It is often underground or elevated. At crossings of metro lines, they are multi-level....
and Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM) to the north and the Complexe Desjardins
Complexe Desjardins
Complexe Desjardins is a mixed-use office, hotel, and shopping mall complex located in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The project was designed to develop the eastern end of downtown Montreal, it is located in the quadrilateral formed by Saint Catherine, Saint-Urbain, and Jeanne Mance streets, and René...
to the south as part of the Underground City.
The site is decorated with several works of 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...
including L'artiste est celui qui fait voir l'autre côté des choses by Claude Bettinger
Claude Bettinger
Claude Bettinger was a sculptor and stained glass artist. Born in Lyon in 1942, he died in Quebec in 1998.- Biographical Notes :* He grew up in Alsace.* He arrived in Quebec in 1952.* In 1963, he graduated from the École des Beaux-Arts de Montréal....
, Comme si le temps… de la rue by Pierre Granche
Pierre Granche
Pierre Granche was a French-Canadian sculptor.Having studied at the École des Beaux-Arts de Montréal and the Université de Vincennes in Paris, he taught in the art history department of the Université de Montréal for more than twenty years until his death in Montreal.As a sculptor, his works are...
, and La voie lactée by Geneviève Cadieux
Geneviève Cadieux
-Teaching:* Concordia University, 1991 – present;* Guest professor, École nationale supérieure des beaux-arts in Paris, 1994;* École nationale des beaux-arts in Grenoble, 1996;...
. A bust of conductor Wilfrid Pelletier
Wilfrid Pelletier
Joseph Louis Wilfrid Pelletier , CC was a Canadian conductor, pianist, composer, and arts administrator. He was instrumental in establishing the Montreal Symphony Orchestra, serving as the orchestra's first artistic director and conductor from 1935-1941...
by sculptor Arto Tchakmaktchian
Arto Tchakmaktchian
Arto Tchakmaktchian is a Canadian sculptor and painter of Egyptian birth. A member of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts, he began his professional studies at the age of 15 at the Art School of Panos Terlemezian. In 1962 he won first prize at the International Contemporary Ceramics Exhibition in...
is on permanent display in the entrance hall.
In the summer the esplanade and the street in front of it make up one of the important outdoor sites of the Festival International de Jazz de Montréal
Festival International de Jazz de Montréal
The Festival International de Jazz de Montréal is an annual jazz festival held in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The Montreal Jazz Fest holds the 2004 Guinness World Record as the world's largest jazz festival...
.