Marie-Josée Bourassa is an autodidact painter originating from the Mauricie region, she has been established in Quebec city (Canada) since 2001.  At the age of 13, while on a visit to old Québec, she felt a calling to create art.  Since then, she constantly refines her pictorial techniques. Combining her profession of psychologist and her artistic carrer, art is a way to transcend suffering, to create for the observer a context for introspection or to infuse joy, vitality, wellbeing, and calm and to depict the beauty of life.  Her encounter with the artist Élise Genest was a turning point, she decided to commit herself actively in her artistic carrer. Since then, the opportunities to show her work in individuals and collectives exhibitions has multiplied.

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​Marie-Josée invites you to smell freshly picked flowers, to immerse yourself in autumn colours, to feel the sun’s warmth or the fresh morning breeze.  

Through art, Marie-Josée opens the door to a space of pure happiness, she lives in the present, she  explores a world that forms gradually. Combining the work of painter and psychologist, alternating between art and the art of psychotherapy, her work celebrates life, light and beauty and encourages introspection, time out and calm.    

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Her artistic approach is intuitive, creating becomes the source of her inspiration.  She first approaches the piece through texture in a spontaneous way. Then, with acrylic paint, she plays freely with colors, allowing the gesture, the material and the nuances to guide her work. Creation is for her an act of faith and openness.  Without expectations, simply in the present moment, she welcome what appears on the canvas. A succession of layers, of marks allows the emergence of a coherent whole.  She let the work inspire her and gradually figurative elements emerge and are highlighted. Therefore, abstract or semi-figurative paintings originate of a dialogue between the artist and the canvas, created and recreated from itself, becoming a constant source of inspiration.

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The influence of psychology is present in the final result as well as in the creation process.  Indeed, her intention has an artist is to help people.  Colors and ambiance choices aim to infuse a state of wellbeing in the observer. Likewise, by her process, her art is a statement of confidence in the ability to change and to improve.   Jean-Paul Sartre wrote that « What matters is not what has been done to us but what we do with what’s been done to us1 »; this is her vision of artwork creation and of self-transformation.

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1  free translation from : Sartre, Jean-Paul. Saint Genest, comédien ou martyr, Paris, Gallimard, 1952