Prolific filmmaker Luc Bourdon is one of Canada’s leading video artists. Over the last 25 years, he has made some fifty works ranging from documentary to drama and experimental pieces. Many of his works, like Ne retenez pas votre souffle (1986), Question de bande (1998), De la parole aux actes (2000), and La grande bibliothèque (2005), focus on the arts and culture. All of his productions draw on the notions of history and memory, themes that also form the crux of The Memory of Angels (2008), Bourdon’s first work for the National Film Board of Canada.

Throughout the 1980s, Bourdon gained recognition through singular works that underscored his originality and probing mind, like Distance (1984, co-directed with François Girard), Touei (1985), and The Story of Feniks and Abdullah (1988). These early works heralded the artist’s propensity for poetry in both language and form, and his emphasis on sensations rather than on realistic representation. Plan de fuite/Flight Plan (1995) and The Memory of Angels eloquently illustrate this. Throughout his multi-faceted career, Bourdon has established himself as a tireless experimenter, an artist who offers up immersive, impressionist worlds (see Classes de maîtres, 2008, his film about the Conservatoire de musique et d’art dramatique du Québec). His practice is marked by a consistent effort to reshape the moving image through a playful approach to sound and image.

He has occasionally departed from the single-channel format to create video installations: his 1986 work Promenades lumières, made with Josette Bélanger, was part of the Cent jours d’art contemporain de Montréal; his 1992 piece Quinto et Hommage consisted of two installations shown at Montreal’s Oboro gallery and elsewhere; and À mille lieux, a site-specific work, showed at the Bonsecours Market as part of the celebrations for Montreal’s 350th anniversary in 1992. Ever ready to engage with other artistic forms, he has also worked in the theatre, notably with René-Daniel Dubois for Michel Garneau’s Guerriers at Espace Go (1997) and Eugène Ionesco’s Exit the King (1999). His consistent, multi-form work earned him the 1998 Bell Canada Award from the Canada Council for the Arts.

A noteworthy presence in Quebec film and video, he has long been associated with artist-run centres and arts organizations, notably as a member of Vidéographe from 1982 to 1998 and of Les Films de l’autre from 1990 to 1996.

In addition to his film work, he has taught videomaking at various universities since 1994. From 2000 to 2003, he was artistic and executive director of the Festival du nouveau cinéma et des nouveaux médias de Montréal (FCMM). He has also been part of numerous think tanks and has helped organize many video events, including La quinzaine de la vidéo (1989, 1998), Heures exquises! (1993) and School’s Out (1995).