Patrick Thibert: Evolution of Works on Paper 1971–2023 Opening Reception

The exhibition, “Patrick Thibert: Evolution of Works on Paper 1971–2023”, is an overview of Patrick’s two-dimensional activity over the fifty-two-year period that this exhibition covers. His approach to the two-dimensional works on paper has changed with the decades. The works on paper have been, at times, a two-dimensional representation of finished sculptures. At other times they documented other options whether for free standing sculptures or for wall dependent sculptures. Each body of sculptures asked for a different way of rendering the idea(s) in two-dimensional form through a variety of drawing mediums from acrylic paint to charcoal to pastel powders. Some of the works on paper are colour studies for possible future powder coated, aluminum, wall sculptures.

BIOGRAPHY:

Patrick Thibert (b. 1943) was born and raised in Windsor, Ontario and for the last forty years has resided in Mt. Brydges, Ontario located just west of London. Thibert holds a diploma in Chemical Technology from the Western Ontario Institute of Technology, Windsor, (1961‒1965), renamed St. Clair College of Applied Art and Technology, A Bachelor of Fine Art (sculpture) from the University of Windsor (1968‒1972) and a Master of Fine Art (sculpture), from Florida State University, Tallahassee, Florida, (1972‒1974).

Thibert has been a practicing sculptor and art educator. He taught as a graduate student at Florida State University, in Tallahassee, Florida, (1973 and 1973‒1974). He taught as a sessional instructor at St. Clair College of Applied Art and Technology, Windsor during the 1974‒1975 academic year. Thibert taught full-time, for 28 years, at Fanshawe College of Applied Art and Technology, London, Ontario from 1975‒2003. Over the decades Patrick Thibert has taught drawing, two- and three-dimensional design, and sculpture.

Patrick has been an active member of the London art community since arriving in London in 1975 to teach at Fanshawe College. He was an active member of the Forest City Gallery for 15 years in a number of capacities. He has been on the Board of Museum London. He has also served on the acquisitions committee at the McIntosh Gallery at Western University. Thibert has given talks on his works in a variety of venues from the University of Windsor, the University of Calgary, Emily Carr University of Art and Design in Vancouver, and at various museums and galleries in Canada.

Thibert has consistently worked three-dimensionally while also working two-dimensionally producing a variety of works on paper as studies or documentations of finished works. His studio activity has moved from abstraction as an approach through the 1970’s and early 1980’s to working with image-based narrative sculptures from the late 1980’s to 2010. Since March 2011 he has returned to expressing himself within the abstract tradition and continues to do so.

Patrick Thibert has had over 100 solo and group exhibitions since 1974 in Canada and the United States. His works are found in numerous private and public collections throughout Canada, Germany, and the United States. Public art collections include the Art Gallery of Ontario, the Canada Council art Bank, Museum London, The Glenbow Museum, and the Woodstock Art Gallery, along with many others.