Le Refus global ( en, Total Refusal, link=yes) was an

anti-establishment An anti-establishment view or belief is one which stands in opposition to the conventional social, political, and economic principles of a society. The term was first used in the modern sense in 1958, by the British magazine ''New Statesman'' ...

and

anti-religious Antireligion is opposition to religion. It involves opposition to organized religion, religious practices or religious institutions. The term ''antireligion'' has also been used to describe opposition to specific forms of supernatural worship ...

manifesto A manifesto is a published declaration of the intentions, motives, or views of the issuer, be it an individual, group, political party or government. A manifesto usually accepts a previously published opinion or public consensus or promotes a ...

released on August 9, 1948, in

Montreal Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-most populous city in Canada and List of towns in Quebec, most populous city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian ...

by a group of sixteen young Québécois artists and intellectuals that included

Paul-Émile Borduas Paul-Émile Borduas (November 1, 1905 – February 22, 1960) was a Québecois artist known for his abstract paintings. He was the leader of the avant-garde Automatiste movement and the chief author of the Refus Global manifesto of 1948. Bord ...

Jean-Paul Riopelle Jean-Paul Riopelle, (October 7, 1923 – March 12, 2002) was a Canadian painter and sculptor from Quebec. He had one of the longest and most important international careers of the sixteen signatories of the ''Refus Global'', the 1948 manif ...

and

Françoise Sullivan Françoise Sullivan LL.D (born 10 June 1923) is a Canadian painter, sculptor, dancer and choreographer. Biography Early life Françoise Sullivan grew up in Montreal, Quebec, the youngest child and only girl in a middle-class family with fo ...

. Le Refus Global originated from a group called

Les Automatistes Les Automatistes were a group of Québécois artistic dissidents from Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The movement was founded in the early 1940s by painter Paul-Émile Borduas. Les Automatistes were so called because they were influenced by Surrea ...

, led by Paul-Émile Borduas. This group created

abstract painting Abstract art uses visual language of shape, form, color and line to create a composition which may exist with a degree of independence from visual references in the world. Western art had been, from the Renaissance up to the middle of the 19th ...

s inspired by French

surrealists Surrealism is a cultural movement that developed in Europe in the aftermath of World War I in which artists depicted unnerving, illogical scenes and developed techniques to allow the unconscious mind to express itself. Its aim was, according to l ...

of the time and scorned all academic teaching available at the time in

Quebec Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirtee ...

. The signatories were also highly influenced by French poet

André Breton André Robert Breton (; 19 February 1896 – 28 September 1966) was a French writer and poet, the co-founder, leader, and principal theorist of surrealism. His writings include the first ''Surrealist Manifesto'' (''Manifeste du surréalisme'') o ...

stream-of-consciousness In literary criticism, stream of consciousness is a narrative mode or method that attempts "to depict the multitudinous thoughts and feelings which pass through the mind" of a narrator. The term was coined by Daniel Oliver in 1840 in ''First Li ...

style and extolled the creative force of the subconscious. Le Refus Global was a manifesto that completely rejected the social, artistic and psychological norms and values of Québécois society at the time. Calling for "an untamed need for liberation," the manifesto cried out for "resplendent anarchy" and criticized the "cassocks that have remained the sole repositories of faith, knowledge, truth, and national wealth."

Pierre Gauvreau Pierre Gauvreau (23 August 19227 April 2011) was a Québécois painter and writer who also worked in film and television production. Career He was born in Montreal, and enrolled at the École des Beaux-Arts de Montréal in 1937, today part of ...

, one of the signatories, said that the main message of the manifesto is that "God does not exist." Jean Paul Riopelle, who also signed the document, interviewed later, said it was "written by Borduas...to reject those conditions, both material and intellectual, that had been our lot up to that point". Of the 400 published copies of Le Refus Global, selling for a dollar apiece, only about half of them were sold. Notwithstanding, this manifesto caused an uproar, and as a result of this manifesto, Borduas lost his job at the École du Meuble de Montréal.Time.com: Resplendent Anarchy
/ref> Later, the manifesto was translated into different languages and was read in America and Europe. It has been said by commentators that from the publication of this manifesto, "modern

French Canada French Canadians (referred to as Canadiens mainly before the twentieth century; french: Canadiens français, ; feminine form: , ), or Franco-Canadians (french: Franco-Canadiens), refers to either an ethnic group who trace their ancestry to Fre ...

began", while CBC calls it "one of the most important and controversial artistic and social documents in modern Quebec society". Along with the publication of

Les insolences du Frère Untel ''Les insolences du Frère Untel'' is a book first published in Montreal by ''Les Éditions de l'Homme'' in 1960. In a very short time it sold more than 100,000 copies, in a society where a book with a 10,000 copy print run was considered a best s ...

(the Insolences of Brother So-and-so), the asbestos miners' strike of 1949, and the Maurice Richard Riot of 1955, Le Refus Global is widely seen to have been one of the precursors to the

Quiet Revolution The Quiet Revolution (french: Révolution tranquille) was a period of intense socio-political and socio-cultural change in French Canada which started in Quebec after the election of 1960, characterized by the effective secularization of govern ...

The document

The collection, published in 400 copies, contains in addition to the manifest, a series of texts as well as illustrations and photographies.

Signatories

Madeleine Arbour Madeleine Arbour (born March 3, 1923) is a Canadian designer, painter, and journalist living in Quebec. She was the first woman to preside over the Conseil des arts in Montreal. Arbour is recognized as a pioneer in interior design, communicatio ...

Marcel Barbeau Marcel Barbeau, (February 18, 1925 – January 2, 2016) was a Canadian painter, sculptor, graphic and performance artist who used different forms of abstraction and art techniques and technology to express himself. Career Born in Montreal, he stu ...

* *

Claude Gauvreau Claude Gauvreau (August 19, 1925 – July 7, 1971 in Montreal, Quebec) was a Canadian playwright, poet, sound poet and polemicist. He was a member of the radical Automatist movement and a contributor to the revolutionary Refus Global Manifest ...

Muriel Guilbault Muriel Guilbault (February 18, 1922 – January 3, 1952) was a Canadian actress and comedian. She signed the Refus Global, an artistic manifesto published in 1948, with the support of fifteen co-signers including painters Jean-Paul Riopelle, Clau ...

Marcelle Ferron Marcelle Ferron, (January 29, 1924 – November 19, 2001), a Canadian '' Québécoise'' painter and stained glass artist, was one of the original 16 signatories of Paul-Émile Borduas's Refus global manifesto, and a major figure in the Quebec c ...

Fernand Leduc Fernand Leduc (4 July 1916 – 28 January 2014) was a Canadian abstract expressionist painter and a major figure in the Quebec contemporary art scene in the 1940s and 1950s. During his 50-year career, Leduc participated in many expositions in Ca ...

Thérèse Leduc Therese or Thérèse is a variant of the feminine given name Teresa. It may refer to: Persons Therese *Duchess Therese of Mecklenburg-Strelitz (1773–1839), member of the House of Mecklenburg-Strelitz and a Duchess of Mecklenburg * Therese of B ...

Jean-Paul Mousseau Jean-Paul Mousseau (January 1, 1927 – February 7, 1991) was a Quebec artist. He was a student of Paul-Émile Borduas, a member of the Automatist group and a founding member of the Association of Non-Figurative Artists of Montreal. Career Jea ...

* * Louise Renaud *

Françoise Riopelle Françoise Riopelle (; 18 June 1927 – 18 July 2022) was a Canadian dancer and choreographer from Montreal. She is considered one of the pioneers of modern dance in Quebec. Riopelle was also a dedicated activist, associated with the Automatis ...

* Jean Paul Riopelle *

It was signed by 15 artists, including eight men and seven women, an unusually high proportion of women for the time period. However, not all signatories had the same perspective on the Automatist ideology. Some, such as Pierre Gauvreau and Riopelle, wanted to catch up to Europe artistically, while others, such as Borduas and Claude Gauvreau, wanted to push the project even farther, for Quebec to rid itself of the image of a "poor little population" in the process of decolonization." They were calling not only for a radical artistic movement but for a radical social movement as well. Claude Gauvreau was particularly influenced by the precursors of

and pre-surrealists. He also wrote his first poetry collection, ''Étal mixte'', just after his discovery of ''Vingt-Cinq poèmes'' by

Tzara Tristan Tzara (; ; born Samuel or Samy Rosenstock, also known as S. Samyro; – 25 December 1963) was a Romanian and French avant-garde poet, essayist and performance artist. Also active as a journalist, playwright, literary and art critic, comp ...

. In Quebec, unlike Europe, automatism was better understood by everyday people while being snubbed by the elite, making it more of a movement for the democratization of art.

Context and follow-up

In the late 1940s, Automatism in Quebec quietly established itself, influenced by the works of

Nietzsche Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (; or ; 15 October 1844 – 25 August 1900) was a German philosopher, Prose poetry, prose poet, cultural critic, Philology, philologist, and composer whose work has exerted a profound influence on contemporary philo ...

and

Freud Sigmund Freud ( , ; born Sigismund Schlomo Freud; 6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939) was an Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, a clinical method for evaluating and treating pathologies explained as originating in conflicts in ...

. Borduas, however, did not associate with any party, and was considered an

anarchist Anarchism is a political philosophy and movement that is skeptical of all justifications for authority and seeks to abolish the institutions it claims maintain unnecessary coercion and hierarchy, typically including, though not neces ...

, with ''Refus Global'' being a comment on the decadence of Christian civilization. ''Refus Global'' scandalized authorities and the press, who condemned and censored a large part of the manifesto. Borduas lost his job as a professor at the École du Meuble de Montréal, a position that he had occupied since 1937, and he went into exile in the United States. Besides this, however, the manifesto did not cause much immediate disruption due to the near total absence of mass media such as television.

, in the documentary ''Les Enfants de Refus global'', would go on to explain that ''Refus Global'' was not a well-delineated social movement, but rather a manifesto against a very closed social structure. Only later would ''Refus Global'' come to be associated with the social-democratic and nationalist movements. In the 1980s, a period where Quebec was striving to clarify its identity and political autonomy, Borduas was perceived as a hero, saving the cultural integrity of the

French Canadian French Canadians (referred to as Canadiens mainly before the twentieth century; french: Canadiens français, ; feminine form: , ), or Franco-Canadians (french: Franco-Canadiens), refers to either an ethnic group who trace their ancestry to Fren ...

population. Since then, ''Refus Global'' has become a reference for the idea that the ''

Grande Noirceur The Grande Noirceur (, English, Great Darkness) refers to the regime of conservative policies undertaken by the governing body of Quebec Premier Maurice Le Noblet Duplessis from 1936 to 1939 and from 1944 to 1959. Rural areas Duplessis favour ...

'' had not drowned out all innovative intellectual life in Quebec; as a result, it is seen as a precursor to the

. Fifty years later, the interpretation of ''Refus Global'' in the intellectual history of Quebec continues to be the subject of reflections. In 1998, the Condorcet Prize was given to all the signatories of ''Refus Global.'' That same year,

Manon Barbeau Manon Barbeau (born 1949) is a Québécois filmmaker, director, writer, and co-founder of Wapikoni Mobile, an organisation that helps First Nations youth learn the art of filmmaking. She has been Wapikoni Mobile’s general director since 200 ...

released the film ''Les Enfants de Refus Global''.

Notes

External links

French version
at

Wikisource Wikisource is an online digital library of free-content textual sources on a wiki, operated by the Wikimedia Foundation. Wikisource is the name of the project as a whole and the name for each instance of that project (each instance usually rep ...

English version
''Total Refusal''
Video: A Part of Our Heritage – Paul Émile Borduas
* ''Total Refusal (Refus Global): the manifesto of the Montréal Automatists'', translated by Ray Ellenwood. Holstein, Ont: Exile Editions, 2009 ** *Ellenwood, Ray. ''Egregore : a history of the Montréal automatist movement''. Toronto:

Exile Editions Exile Editions is an independent literary publisher based in Toronto. It was founded in 1976 by poet, novelist and artist Barry Callaghan and is currently headed by Michael Callaghan. Exile has published over 320 titles to date, including a wide ...

, 1992. ** * Nasgaard, Roald. ''The Automatiste revolution : Montreal, 1941–1960''. Vancouver: Douglas & McIntyre, 2009. **
{{Canadianart Canadian surrealist artists Art manifestos Culture of Quebec Criticism of religion Modern art Quebec art Surrealist groups 1948 documents

The document

Signatories

Context and follow-up

See also

Notes

External links