Tropic Celebration

About Tropic Celebration

This contemporary abstract painting by Paul Fournier captures the turquoise-colored waters of the Caribbean.

Paul Fournier is among the most significant painters in the Canadian art world—a masterful artist whose lyrical and colourful expressionist work is distinctively his own. He works ‘free form’, without a sketch and chooses colours as he works—a highly intuitive process that results in uniquely colourful artwork. Traces of Fournier’s influences—the storied abstract artist Jack Bush and Matisse, the French artist and leader of the early 20th century Fauvist movement can be seen in his lyrical form and vivid palette. This joyful, large acrylic piece illustrates a view of the deep blue waters of the Caribbean—its sea life rendered in bright yellow, orange, hot pink, purple, orange, green and white appears to float on the canvas.

"There is a beauty and a sense of rightness about things that happen immediately.” Paul Fournier

“His best works continue to be joyous metaphors for intense feelings about the natural world, filtered through experience of the painters he admires most, and translated into a non-specific language of gesture, inflection and color.” Karen Wilkin, Art Critic


Paul Fournier was born during the Great Depression in Simcoe, Ontario. He first studied at the Ontario College of Art and Design in 1959 and went on to study printmaking at McMaster University in Hamilton in 1967. Fournier also received an Honorary Doctor of Laws from Sir Wilfrid Laurier University in 1996, where he’d also been the artist in residence. Fournier became a member of a group of artists in Toronto who were mentored by Jack Bush and together explored modernist expressionism. During a career that spans six decades, Fournier has had solo exhibitions in several Canadian cities and in the U.S. His work is held in private collections in North and South America and Europe. Public collections include the Art Gallery of Ontario, the National Gallery of Canada and the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington.