Mural Mosaic artist and children’s book illustrator Lewis Lavoie is well-known for pop art performance portraits.
Courtesy NOA Productions Go here and click on each panel for information on the individual paintings that make up the Le Cadeau du Cheval mural. He often creates quick, fluid paintings that are auctioned to the highest bidder to raise money for important social causes at charity events across his homeland of Canada. Lavoie’s artistic talent was recognized early on. His school counselors encouraged him to study art, but instead — forgoing art school in 1987 at age 23 — Lavoie and his friend Barry Peterson started a movie-making company called Reel Effects. “It was a guts-and-vinegar special-effects house,” Lavoie says. “This is where I got my schooling.” The two learned by asking questions of larger production studios.Soon the bigger production houses were hiring them, but Lavoie realized that what he really wanted to do was illustration. He began illustrating children’s books, and through his work with children the Mural Mosaic idea was born. Invited to create and design a mural and have children participate in its completion, Lavoie wanted to explore something new.
Digital photo mosaics were becoming all the rage, but as an illustrator and fine artist, Lavoie wondered if he could create that kind of mosaic and still allow the children to paint what was special to them.