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L’épierrement (1987) (Rock removal), Thérère Sauvageau

Painting of a period scene. A woman, a man and two children are removing stones from a field.

L’épierrement (1987), Thérèse Sauvageau. MCQ 2007-881.

Source: Musée de la civilisation, MCQ 2007-881, gift of Thérèse Sauvageau.

L’arrache-pierres (1989) (The Stone-puller), Thérèse Sauvageau.

As British traveller John Lambert reported in 1814, the seigneury of Grondines “consists of one vast bed of gray rock or lime-stone, slightly covered with a poor soil about half a dozen inches in depth, intermingled with an immense quantity of loose stones, from which it is labour in vain to attempt to clear it. The people who reside on this barren spot, which gives birth only to pines and firs, are of course extremely poor, and scarcely able to procure enough for their subsistence.”[1]

It seems that the people of Grondines have managed to make the most of what the land has given them!

[1] Lambert, J. 1814. Travels through Canada and the United States of North America, in the years 1806, 1807 and 1808. London : Printed for C. Cradock and W. Joy, pp. 133-134.