The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts unveils the Architecture of
its New Pavilion of Quebec and Canadian Art and its New Concert Hall

After many months of work, construction of the Claire and Marc Bourgie Pavilion
of Quebec and Canadian Art at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (MMFA) and
restoration of the 1894 heritage church, which has been converted to a 444-seat
concert hall, have been completed. Both the schedule and the budget have been
respected. The Museum's curators, led by Nathalie Bondil, the MMFA's Director
and Chief Curator, will soon complete the task of installing 600 works on the
pavilion's six floors. The new pavilion will open to the public this fall.

The Museum, which celebrated its 150th anniversary in 2010, is expanding once
again, thanks to the unwavering determination of the Museum's former Chairman
of the Board, Bernard Lamarre, who initiated the project, and Brian M. Levitt,
the current Chairman. The addition of this fourth pavilion will more than double
the area devoted to Quebec and Canadian art. In this new building (which has
already received two awards — the 2010 Canadian Architect Awards of Merit and
the 2011 Award of Excellence from the Urban Development Institute of Quebec),
the Museum will soon be presenting a unique and coherent look at the history of
Quebec and Canadian art. With admission and audioguides free of charge at all
times, the new Claire and Marc Bourgie Pavilion will give thousands of visitors,
school groups, families and tourists an opportunity to learn more about our heritage,
which will be shown here in a historical context. The Bourgie Concert Hall, which will
present numerous concerts and activities every year, will help spark a new dialogue
between the visual arts and music.

   · The Claire and Marc Bourgie Pavilion of Quebec and Canadian Art
   · Attention to architectural harmony
   · A unique setting for our heritage works
   · 600 works on six floors
   · A complex heritage restoration
   · 146 stained glass windows are reinstalled
   · A unique concert hall
   · An expanded Sculpture Garden
   · And a complete reinstallation of the Museum's permanent collection
   · A judicious budget supported by generosity

The Claire and Marc Bourgie Pavilion of Quebec and Canadian Art:
saving and restoring a heritage monument

This innovative expansion project includes a heritage building, the Erskine and
American Church, deconsecrated in 2004 and acquired by the Museum in 2008.
With this acquisition, the Museum embarked on a project that is unique in Canada:
on one hand, a pavilion with a resolutely contemporary look, on the other, a concert
hall in a Romanesque Revival building more than a century old. Joining the two
buildings together made it possible to preserve a “national historic site.” A model
of architectural conversion, it also serves as an example internationally, since few
such projects exist.

This project, which called for an ingenious design, was assigned to Provencher Roy +
Associés architectes, and led by Claude Provencher and Matthieu Geoffrion, who worked
with 450 professionals and craftsmen on this huge building site. Transforming part of
the structure to be able to display works was a necessary choice, since it was not possible
to adapt it to meet the museological conservation requirements for works of art.
The church had already undergone remodelling, including one in 1938, which involved
separating the sanctuary from the other community functions at the rear of the church.
Not only is the museum function an ideal fit with the church, giving it a new life, it also
makes it possible to conserve a “Canadian architectural treasure.” In awarding its 2011
Excellence Award to the architects of the Claire and Marc Bourgie Pavilion, the Urban
Development Institute of Quebec congratulated Provencher Roy + Associés architectes
for their in-depth reflection on the challenges presented by the project, its exceptional
urban integration and its design, which brings together the past and the future.

Attention to architectural harmony

Despite what may at first appear to be a rather architecturally eclectic complex —
four pavilions from very different eras and with differing structures — attention
to the architectural harmony between the new pavilion and the other pavilions was
an imperative from the outset and an essential requirement for Provencher Roy +
Associés architectes. They had to find materials that, although specific to the new
contemporary section, were also consistent with the existing church and with
the Museum's other pavilions.

The white marble used for the Michal and Renata Hornstein Pavilion (architects
Edward & W.S. Maxwell) and the Jean-Noël Desmarais Pavilion (architect Moshe
Safdie) was the ideal choice for the exterior of the new pavilion, thereby completing
a trilogy with the existing buildings and forming a coherent whole. Marble and walls
of clear glass for the fenestration of the new architecture set it apart from the church
but are cohesive with the Museum's other pavilions, the white marble linking them
physically and symbolically. The use of marble for the three buildings is also unique
in Montreal and in Quebec, where this lavish material is not often used. It comes
from the same quarry in Vermont that provided the marble for the Michal and Renata
Hornstein Pavilion in 1912 and the Jean-Noël Desmarais Pavilion in 1991. The 1,500
sheets of white marble covering the outer walls of the Claire and Marc Bourgie Pavilion
were installed so that the veins in the marble form a coherent pattern, creating a stone
mural. Thus, twenty-seven successive cuts from sixteen blocks originating in the same
wall of the quarry reproduce the same configuration of veins twenty-seven times.

A unique setting for our heritage works

The fourth pavilion adds over two thousand square metres of gallery space, more
than doubling the area for the presentation of Quebec and Canadian art and increasing
the MMFA's total exhibition space by 20%. The project's architects used glass walls
to create an airy, light-filled space on each floor of the new pavilion, at the entrance
to each gallery, to allow for a connection with the city. On the top level, a magnificent
glassed-in gallery affords a stunning view of Mount Royal.

600 works on six floors

With a new installation conceived primarily by Jacques Des Rochers, the Curator of
Early Canadian Art, 600 works are presented on six floors. The installation design
was done by interior designer Daniel Castonguay, under the supervision of the Museum's
Head of Exhibitions Production, Sandra Gagné. Hundreds of works will now be displayed,
including many major acquisitions that were made as part of the Museum's 150th
anniversary campaign and works recently restored or re-framed. Never before has
the MMFA made such an effort to study, restore, exhibit and promote this heritage
collection. Some 5,000 hours were devoted to restoring a hundred works, under
the direction of Richard Gagnier, Head of the Conservation Department. Curators
Anne Grace (Modern Art) and Stéphane Aquin (Contemporary Art) are also involved
in the installation of this collection in the new pavilion.

Access to this building and its collections will be free of charge for all at all times.
The presentation will be arranged chronologically, from top to bottom:

On Level 4, Inuit art will be presented in an area adjacent to a glassed-in
gallery with a panoramic view of the mountain, where private events can be held.
Level 3, with the theme Founding Identities, will feature works from the colonial
period (1700s to 1870s) associated with the origins of Canadian art, dominated
by portraiture and religious art, with the subsequent emergence of a school
of landscape painting; the presentation of historic and contemporary Amerindian
art will provide a critical, retrospective look at their contact with Euro-Canadians.
On Level 2, visitors will discover the Annual Exhibitions Era (1880s to 1920s)
associated with such artists as William Brymner, Maurice Cullen and Marc-Aurèle
de Foy Suzor-Coté. This section will also dedicate space to major artists like
Ozias Leduc, James Wilson Morrice and Alfred Laliberté.
On Level 1, Towards Modernism (1920s to 1930s) will feature the first groups
of modern artists: in Montreal, the Beaver Hall Group, which explored Quebec
cityscapes and rural landscapes and the human figure; in Toronto, the Group
of Seven, which acted as a standard bearer for a national identity through their
depictions of the Canadian wilderness. There will also be special gallery space
devoted to Marc-Aurèle Fortin.
The Sherbrooke Street level will present the Age of the Manifesto (1940s
to 1960s), where visitors will see exceptional works by artists like Alfred Pellan,
Paul-Émile Borduas and the Museum's rich collection of works by Jean-Paul
Riopelle, from 1947 to 1977, which will be featured in a special gallery.
The "Mountain Gallery," the underground passageway linking the Claire
and Marc Bourgie Pavilion to the Museum's other pavilions, will feature
the theme Expanding Fields (1960s to 1970s). Here, visitors will discover
imposing works by Louis Archambault, Greg Curnoe, Jean McEwen, Guido
Molinari, Michael Snow and Claude Tousignant, among others, in a space
leading to the Galleries of International Contemporary Art in the Jean-Noël
Desmarais Pavilion. This vast, forty-five-metre-long gallery will be used for
the installation of monumental works, like Riopelle's gigantic Ice Canoe (1992).

A complex heritage restoration

Saving the Erskine and American Church was central to the Museum's expansion
project. In acquiring this church, the MMFA wanted to restore it and give it a new
purpose. Far from being the least expensive option, this responsible and heritage
solution proved to be more arduous than building a new structure. It is important
to point this out, as one might assume the exact opposite in the case of an existing
building. "This choice by the Museum is a major initiative to beautify our city," said
Nathalie Bondil, the Museum's Director. "It is also an architectural conversion
we hope will serve as an example internationally."

The Museum planned the project based on recommendations made by Jean-Claude
Marsan, urbanist and architect, in his 2006 heritage study. The heritage church has
been restored in order to conserve the building's Romanesque Revival architecture,
which echoes the massive, powerful style of early Medieval churches. This building,
designed by Montreal architect Alexander Cooper Hutchison and inaugurated in 1894,
is a rare example of the Romanesque Revival style in Montreal. Designated a "national
historic site" by Heritage Canada in 1998 for its history and its remarkable architecture,
this church is notable for its imposing façade, an ingenious combination of heavily
rusticated grey limestone and lavishly sculpted brown Miramichi sandstone, which make
it a unique composition in Montreal. By the end of this project, each of the stones will
have been restored and cleaned. The majestic dome characteristic of the Byzantine style
is also very unusual in Montreal churches.

146 stained glass windows are reinstalled

The twenty Tiffany windows, which are now part of the Museum's collection, were commis-
sioned at the turn of the twentieth century for the American Presbyterian Church on
Dorchester Street (now demolished). They were then reinstalled in the Erskine and
American Church on Sherbrooke Street in 1937-1938. Seventeen of these windows were
created during the heyday of the Tiffany Glass and Decorating Company in New York,
between 1897 and 1902. Their quality was confirmed by two leading Tiffany experts —
Alice Cooney Frelinghuysen, curator of American decorative arts at the Metropolitan
Museum of Art in New York, and conservator Thomas Venturella, a master American
glass craftsman. The ensemble was one of only two commissions by Tiffany in Canada
and one of the few surviving religious series in North America. It is without a doubt
the most important collection of its kind in the country. Four of these outstanding double
lancet windows are enormous: nearly four metres high and 1.5 metres wide.

Following research conducted by Rosalind Pepall, the Museum's Senior Curator of Decorative
Arts and under the supervision of Richard Gagnier, the restoration work was carried out
in Montreal by Françoise Saliou and Thomas Belot of Atelier La Pierre de Lune. The
restoration of the Tiffany windows of the Erskine and American Church was the largest
such project ever undertaken by the Museum, necessitating more than 5,000 hours
of work and direct investments of more than half a million dollars. Today, after more
than half a century in obscurity, this priceless Montreal and Canadian heritage treasure
has at last been made accessible.

To allow music lovers who attend concerts and Museum visitors who stroll through Bourgie
Hall to truly appreciate these windows, the Museum installed an innovative system of
permanent backlighting, the first to be carried out on such a scale.

In all, 146 stained glass windows were also restored and reinstalled in the new concert hall.
Of particular interest is a superb six-panel window in the narthex, a 1939 commission
by Charles William Kelsey depicting views of Montreal and the Saint Lawrence from
the Westmount summit. A large half-rose window above six lights depicting biblical
figures, created by Peter Haworth in 1938-1939, can also be admired.

A unique concert hall

Already renowned for its acoustics, the church's nave has been restored and transformed
into a 444-seat concert hall – Bourgie Hall – as well as an exhibition space for the presen-
tation of works from the Museum's collection. The architecture and stained glass windows
will be the subject of guided tours given by the Museum's Volunteer Guides and the audio-
guide that will be offered to visitors free of charge at all times. More than a hundred concerts
will be presented in the concert hall every year, along with educational and cultural activities
associated with music and the fine arts, screenings of HD films and special events. Its size
makes it perfect for chamber groups and other small ensembles such as string orchestras.
The music presented in Bourgie Hall will range from early music to contemporary fare,
including jazz and world music, to give audiences access to a wide range of musical expe-
riences related to the Museum's encyclopedic collection. Bourgie Hall, named in honour
of Pierre Bourgie, the patron and the mastermind behind the Arte Musica Foundation,
a foundation in residence at the Museum since 2008 that is directed by Isolde Lagacé.
The concert hall will also open in the fall of 2011.

The quality of the already renowned acoustics have been improved on by Go Multimédia
(stage and electronics), consultants Legault Davidson (acoustics) and the addition of
a birch shell over the stage. The hall will have 311 removable seats, designed by Michel
Dallaire, on the parterre level, and 133 seats using the original pews (now with cushions)
on the balcony. The interior was designed by a team of architects, supervised by Matthieu
Geoffrion, in collaboration with Christiane Michaud, designer, who acted as a consultant
in the selection of colours and textiles, whose joint research with the Museum's curatorial
team ensured that the heritage elements in the hall were respected.

Bourgie Hall boasts two new Steinway pianos from New York, two harpsichords and a
chamber organ with twelve stops, two manuals and pedal, built by Hellmuth Wolff. Even
before its opening in fall 2011, some 125 concerts have already been programmed
by the Arte Musica Foundation and by private organizations, confirming the community's
interest in a hall of this type, which is both intimate and spectacular.

The public will be able to access the Claire and Marc Bourgie Pavilion and the concert hall
by a new main entrance through the former crypt, which has been transformed into a lobby
that opens directly onto Sherbrooke Street (ticket counter, cloakroom and bar-boutique)
and to the rehearsal room and artists' dressing rooms. This entrance is clad in the same
marble as all the Museum's entrances.

There is something utterly unique and original about the Museum's architectural evolution.
While most museums in Europe and North America are located in homogeneous, contiguous
spaces, the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts has developed as a series of pavilions, a concept
that has shaped its personality and its image. Indeed, the history of the Montreal Museum
of Fine Arts is that of a museum that has adapted to a constantly changing urban environment.
For more than 150 years, the Museum has developed and expanded, pavilion after pavilion,
like a small city within the city. Its buildings serve as an overview of Montreal's architectural
history; the Museum consists of a group of buildings that attest to the city's architectural
diversity.

An expanded Sculpture Garden

The Museum's Sculpture Garden, which dates back to 2002, will expand and will become
one of the largest collections of public art in Montreal. Over twenty works will be installed
in this garden, accessible to the public on Du Musée Avenue and Sherbrooke Street. They
will help define the “boundaries” of this new four-pavilion museum complex. New works
will be added to those already on display, by such artists as David Altmedj, César, Aaron
Curry, Jim Dine, Barry Flanagan, François-Xavier Lalanne, Fernand Léger, Jaume Plensa
and Colleen Wolstenholme, among others.

The Ville de Montréal will create a high-quality urban environment for the Museum
complex that is both distinctive and homogeneous. In addition to improving the comfort
and aesthetics of the outdoor spaces and integrating public artworks, the City is taking
steps to improve pedestrian safety in the vicinity of the Museum. This work will begin
in May and will be completed this fall.

On Level 3, visitors who look out through a glassed-in bay will see a new work by Dominique
Blain, entitled Mirabilia, which will be installed on an outdoor terrace. This Montreal artist was
the winner of a competition presented as part of the policy of integrating art into architecture.
"The model of this work is inspiring: the cemetery of a vanished museum attached to the
dome of the restored church, with numerous artworks that were destroyed or have disappeared,
the shadow or light of a collection seen in negative, like the walled graveyards that nestle
against the apse of a church," said Museum Director Nathalie Bondil. Referring to the archi-
tecture of the Museum's three existing pavilions, Blain designed a series of glass blocks lit
from within, resting on a bed of stones that will cover the entire surface of the new pavilion's
terrace. From the third floor, they will resemble the topography of a city. From the fourth floor,
they will hint at the imprint of lost objects. "While the Museum's role is to conserve works of
art, Mirabilia evokes those that could not be conserved. They reappear in this small, walled
garden, a sort of glass palace the opens onto the city's rooftops," explained Blain. Brought
to life by natural light during the day, the blocks are lit up at night.

…and a complete reinstallation of the Museum's permanent collection

The complete reinstallation of all of the Museum's collections will be carried out simulta-
neously in the three other pavilions, to ensure that the four main spheres of the collection
enjoy better visibility. With interior design by Nathalie Crinière, the Collection of Decorative
Arts and Design will be housed in the Liliane and David M. Stewart Pavilion, and the space
devoted to this collection will double. World cultures will be displayed in the Michal and
Renata Hornstein Pavilion. Thanks to the Montreal firm Architem, the fine arts will be
displayed chronologically, from the Old Masters to contemporary art, in the Jean-Noël
Desmarais Pavilion.

A judicious budget supported by generosity

The MMFA's management is proud to announce that the schedule for the Claire and
Marc Bourgie Pavilion has been respected. As well, this complex and sophisticated
expansion project has been completed within the limits of a judicious budget. The cost
of this project totals $41.7 million, $33.8 million for construction costs, and $7.9 million
for other costs related to the project, such as the purchase of the church, the restoration
of the stained glass windows and the acquisition of equipment for the pavilion and the
concert hall. It should be mentioned that the construction costs for this pavilion were
exceedingly low for this type of project ($580 per square foot), thanks to the rigorous
management of Paul Lavallée, the Museum's Director of Administration.

In addition, the Museum has innovated by establishing a $14 million self-financing
fund; revenues from this fund, which was raised from the private sector, will cover all
of the new pavilion's operating costs. This method of self-financing is exceptional.

The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts offers its special thanks to the Government of Quebec
for its solid support of this project ($19.4 million) and to the Government of Canada
($13.5 million). Along with the financial assistance provided by the two levels of govern-
ment for the construction of the Pavilion of Quebec and Canadian Art, the private sector
donated $900,000 towards the construction and financed other related costs totalling
$7.9 million. The private sector (individuals and corporations) contributed $22.8 million,
or 41% of the total production and operating costs of this major project. The Museum
offers its deepest gratitude to all those who contributed, notably Hydro-Québec, Power
Corporation of Canada, Reitmans (Canada) Limited, the National Bank of Canada,
Andrée and Pierre H. Lessard, the J. Armand Bombardier Foundation, and especially
the Bourgie family of Montreal, who provided exceptional support for this great project
from the very beginning. Museum management would like to thank Claire and Marc
Bourgie, as well as Pierre Bourgie and Claude Bourgie Bovet, for their extraordinary
generosity, which illustrates their passion for art and the importance they place on
culture in Montreal.