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It's not that often that you can get to know someone right away through their art. Denis Robillard is a writer that just happened to take up photography to capture his adventures as a writer. As I walked in to his exhibit, I got the impression that I was looking at a wall in my grandmother's basement. Photographs lined up one after another, perfectly straight, with exactly one inch in between them. Landscapes, portraits, small-town life, rustic ventures, and more of the same made up this exhibit. As a first showing by the artist, Denis Robillard, I was not looking for anything more than a compilation of his work. But after leaving and returning days later when I had more time to look at the pieces, I realized that there was much more that was not captured by my first impression. Robillard's showing was consisted strictly of photography, with the best of the lot being his profile shots and photojournalism. This is fitting with his style because Robillard was almost forced into photography when he became a reporter in Timmins, Ont. Eva Gregori, (a prima ballerina) sighs with life in one black and white shot, while Jimmy Carter looks to the future, in another. Most of the photos were in colour except for the occasional black and white print. Robillard also used some methods of transposing. For example, there is one landscape of some Winnipeg office buildings with an ocean wave overtop. The landscape photos were some of the most provocative pictures in the gallery - with waters rushing over rocky shores, and sunsets as long as the eye could see. There were northern Ontario forests with the sun peering over their treetops, and day to day visions of life amidst the conifers. Besides having to view most of the pictures from up close - being that they were mostly 5X7 - the showing had a deep underbelly that was felt by some passers-by. It was a feeling of contact with the past. A picture of Allen Ginsberg's homestead and a road to J.D. Salinger's home, aroused enough questions and conversation by local viewers, that there wasn't a moment of peace since the show had started. Asking Robillard to tell you about one of his photographs would soon show that he is a man on a constant journey. Although he is a writer and a poet, he is more of an admirer of art, than an artist himself. He would rather tell you about the person in the photo and talk about their form of expression, than discuss his own. Clearly he is a man humbled by his experiences, but with enough talent to pass them off onto you. Only a thematic showing, with a larger spread of shots would have made this exhibit more intimate than it already was.
$40 - $120
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