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Audain initially got turned on to Riopelle during a high school field trip to Peterborough, Ont. He also got turned on to the 1969 Woodstock rock festival and wound up sleeping under his car there, but that is another story.
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Often compared to Jackson Pollock, Riopelle’s nature-inspired works put Quebec of the 1950s and 1960s on the international art map and his career in Paris made him an international star. Best of all, he was a homeboy, and he returned to Quebec after making it big in Europe and he continued to paint prolifically late into life.
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By the 1990s, Audain had earned enough money to buy a Riopelle painting, which typically sell for hundreds of thousands of dollars at auctions, and he subsequently cobbled together a large private collection, part of which he is now parting with to hang in the new pavilion.
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“Right from the age of 16, I could never really get Riopelle’s paintings out of my mind,” he said. “For my money, he is one of the greatest artists of the 20th century.”
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Audain said Canada needs cultural heroes who aren’t always hockey players, especially during a time when the country is dealing with “a bully to the south.” Heroes help bind us together and allow us to share in a common narrative, a vital glue, according to Audain, given Canadians live so far apart.
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The 88-year-old philanthropist lives in West Vancouver, goes into his office four days a week, but has never had a “business plan.” Instead, opportunities arose, some of which went sideways, but other opportunities always seemed to open up.
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“My life really hasn’t been planned at all,” he said.
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Case in point: Audain wound up totally drunk in Rotterdam because of a burst of idealism gone awry to somehow hook up with Fidel Castro in the Sierra Maestra mountain range and become a revolutionary.
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He went so far as to travel to Panama City, where he secured a berth on an English freighter bound for Cuba. Alas, the ship’s British owners, spooked by the increasing intensity of Castro’s guerrilla war, diverted the vessel to the Netherlands and, well, the rest is tattoo history.
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Among the perks of office life, Audain said, is that he gets to be around young people, idealists and otherwise, and he often gets asked for career advice inside and outside of work. He recommends that the best thing to do is “something,” and if it does not work out, do something else.
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“Nowadays, especially, people should move around,” he said.
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The big question is, move where? Canadian real estate prices may be in decline, but a townhouse in Metro Vancouver still sells for $1 million on average, according to the Canadian Real Estate Association.
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“The only people who can afford a home of their own in Toronto or Vancouver are the ones who can go to the bank of mom and dad to help them buy it,” Audain said.
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What is needed is more supply, he said, and a concerted government effort to hack away at the red tape that befuddles the building process. Of course, government helped create the red tape in the first place, so trusting government to fix it requires a true test of faith.
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“Canada is in a bit of a fix, aren’t we? For the first time in our history, the census tells us we’re losing population and I find that hard to believe,” he said. “We have a vast land and there are so many things we could build and do.”
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In the meantime, Audain, who categorizes himself as a glass-half-full optimist, has projects to build, as well as cash and art to donate. His forebears went from rags to riches to rags in three generations. In other words, they blew it all, and he was raised amid memories of better days, with a good dash of family dysfunction.
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His plan is to be remembered differently.
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“I don’t believe in building up dynasties,” he said. “I believe it is the gospel according to Matthew that said it’s easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.”
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