Gilles Désaulniers studied at the Catholic University of America (Washington, D.C.) and the Prague University of Industrial Arts before completing several glassmaking internships in Canada and in France. In the late 1960s, he successfully introduced a course in glass art at the Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières. In addition to participating in numerous exhibitions, he has created works for the integration of art into architecture at the Shawinigan courthouse (1982), the CLSC Suzor-Coté in Victoriaville (1985) and the École Notre-Dame du Mont Carmel in Ottawa (1990). He was also the originator and director of the Canadian Mosaic Symposium, held in 1985 and 1993. Using glass and pâte de verre, Désaulniers explores the division between the material and conceptual aspects of artwork; his translucent, transparent medium is capable of dematerializing forms while also providing them with shape and meaning. For several years, he has been collaborating on a regular basis with the glass art workshop he helped establish at the École des Arts décoratifs de Strasbourg (France). He is a founding member of the Glass Art Association of Canada and a member of both the Glass Art Society and the International Association for the History of Glass.
SEE:
« Silex célèbre ses quinze ans » by Gilles Désaulniers, ESPACE #42, p. 45.
