Roméo Savoie (March 9, 1928 – October 14, 2023) was a Canadian postwar and contemporary artist. One of the first abstract painters in Eastern Canada, the artist's body of work includes more than 4,000 paintings, 50 buildings, six poetry anthologies, and one novel. Savoie, who was appointed a

Member of the Order of Canada The Order of Canada () is a Canadian state order, national order and the second-highest Award, honour for merit in the system of orders, decorations, and medals of Canada, after the Order of Merit. To coincide with the Canadian Centennial, ce ...

(CM) in the

2010 Canadian honours The following are the appointments to various Canadian Honours of 2010. Usually, they are announced as part of the New Year and Canada Day celebrations and are published within the Canada Gazette during year. This follows the custom set out within ...

for his contributions to painting, architecture, and literature, participated in over thirty solo exhibits and as many group ones. His works are a part of major public and private collections in Canada and France.

Early life

Roméo Savoie was born in

Moncton Moncton (; ) is the most populous city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of New Brunswick. Situated in the Petitcodiac River Valley, Moncton lies at the geographic centre of the The Maritimes, Maritime Provinces. Th ...

, New-Brunswick, on March 9, 1928. His father, Calixte Savoie, was a Canadian senator (1955-1970), a businessman, school principal, and teacher. In 1950, Savoie earned his bachelor’s degree in arts from the Collège Saint-Joseph in

Memramcook Memramcook, sometimes also spelled Memramcouke or Memramkouke, is a village in Westmorland County, New Brunswick, Canada. Located in south-eastern New Brunswick, the community is predominantly people of Acadian descent who speak the Chiac de ...

, New Brunswick, and went on to study architecture. After earning his bachelor's degree in architecture from the École des Beaux-Arts in Montreal in 1956, he worked until 1970 with several architectural firms in

Montreal, Quebec Montreal is the List of towns in Quebec, largest city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Quebec, the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-largest in Canada, and the List of North American cit ...

and throughout New Brunswick, eventually opening his own firm. Over the 1956-1970 period, he was responsible for the construction of around fifty buildings. In 1964, Roméo Savoie took a year-long trip to Europe and settled in Carvajal, Spain for three months to practice painting at the encouragement of a French painter. In 1970, Savoie returned to Europe and began a two-year stay in Aix-en-Provence, France, where he dedicated himself entirely to painting. From that period on, his architecture career faded into the background and his passion for painting took over.

Career

Roméo Savoie obtained a Master of Fine Arts from the

Université du Québec à Montréal The (UQAM; ), is a French language, French-language public university, public research university based in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It is the largest constituent element of the system. UQAM was founded on April 9, 1969, by the government o ...

in 1988 and exhibited his work in more than 30 solo shows, including a major retrospective at the Beaverbrook Art Gallery in 2006. Beginning in 1998, the artist had a constant stream of exhibitions in Canada, the Caribbean, Brussels, and Paris. In 1997, Savoie created a mural painting in situ at the Galerie d’Art de l’Université de Moncton on the theme of Evangeline, marking the 150th anniversary of the publication of American poet

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (February 27, 1807 – March 24, 1882) was an American poet and educator. His original works include the poems " Paul Revere's Ride", '' The Song of Hiawatha'', and '' Evangeline''. He was the first American to comp ...

’s work depicting the Great

Acadian Expulsion The Expulsion of the Acadians was the forced removal of inhabitants of the North American region historically known as Acadia between 1755 and 1764 by Great Britain. It included the modern Canadian Maritime provinces of Nova Scotia, New Br ...

of 1755. He coordinated, designed and co-directed, with Lieutenant Governor

Herménégilde Chiasson Herménégilde Chiasson (born 7 April 1946) is a Canadian poet, playwright and visual artist of Acadian origin. Born in Saint-Simon, New Brunswick, he was the 29th Lieutenant Governor of New Brunswick between 2003 and 2009. He is also curr ...

, the exhibition Évangéline, Mythe ou Réalité at the Festival International des Arts Contemporains in La Rochelle, France. Savoie was a passionate supporter of Acadian culture and contemporary art and helped establish art organizations and galleries including Galerie Sans Nom and Galerie 12, both located in Moncton’s Aberdeen Cultural Centre of which he was a founding member. Savoie curated many exhibitions, including an anniversary collection gathered by the Caisses Populaires Acadiennes and a retrospective exhibition held in Bouctouche as part of the 1994

Acadian World Congress The Acadian World Congress, or Le Congrès Mondial Acadien, is a festival of Acadian and Cajun culture and history, held every five years. It is also informally known as the ''Acadian Reunion''. Its creator was André Boudreau (1945-2005). Histor ...

—the largest visual arts show ever presented in Acadie, with over 230 works.

Death

Roméo Savoie died on October 14, 2023, at the age of 95.

Collections

*Canada Council Art Bank *New Brunswick Art Bank *

Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec The Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec (), abbreviated as MNBAQ, is an art museum in Quebec City, Quebec, Canada. The museum is located in National Battlefields Park and is a complex of four buildings. Three of them were purpose-built for ...

*Canadian Cultural Centre in Paris * SNC-Lavalin, in Montreal

Education

* Bachelor of Arts, Collège Saint-Joseph in Memramcook (1950) * Bachelor of Architecture, École des Beaux-Arts in Montreal (1956) * Master of Fine Arts,

(1988) *

Honorary Doctorate An honorary degree is an academic degree for which a university (or other degree-awarding institution) has waived all of the usual requirements. It is also known by the Latin phrases ''honoris causa'' ("for the sake of the honour") or '' ad hon ...

of Visual Arts,

Université de Moncton The Université de Moncton is a Canadian French-language university in New Brunswick. It includes campuses in Edmundston, Moncton, and Shippagan. The university was founded in 1963 following the recommendations of the royal commission on hig ...

(1999)

Awards

* Order of Merit of Université de Moncton Alumni, 2013. * Member of the

Order of Canada The Order of Canada () is a Canadian state order, national order and the second-highest Award, honour for merit in the system of orders, decorations, and medals of Canada, after the Order of Merit. To coincide with the Canadian Centennial, ce ...

, 2010 * Lieutenant Governor's Award for High Achievement in Visual Arts, 2009 *

Strathbutler Award The Strathbutler Award is a biennial prize awarded to a New Brunswick visual artist. It was first awarded in 1991 as an annual prize of $10,000, which increased to $15,000 in 2005. In 2011 it became a biennial award with a value of $25,000, the h ...

, 1998 * Miller Brittain Award, 1994 * Éloize Artist of the Year, 1988

Bibliography

Poetry

''Trajets dispersés'' (1989) ''L'eau brisée'' (1982) ''Dans l'ombre des images'' (1991) ''Une lointaine Irlande'' (2001)

Fiction

''Le mensonge caméléon'' (2010)

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Savoie, Romeo 1928 births 2023 deaths Artists from New Brunswick Canadian abstract painters Acadian people Canadian contemporary painters Canadian male painters École des beaux-arts de Montréal alumni Academic staff of the Université de Moncton Postmodern artists People from Moncton Members of the Order of Canada