History

 
 

Founded in 2009, EN MASSE was the brain-child of Tim Barnard and Jason Botkin, both graduates from the Alberta School of Art and Design.  Living and working in Montreal at the time, they were deeply concerned with questions of how exactly how they could make a living as artists, while supporting the amazing underground cultural landscape of Montreal and beyond. The EN MASSE project was born of a deep mutual interest in how to:

  • Build a strong sense community within the Urban Arts

  • Explore shared creativity through collaboration

  • Put to good use the power of public art

  • Create meaningful, respectful, and mutual beneficial relationships between artists and the community at large

Over the years, EN MASSE organically grew into four major branches of activity:

  1. Museum/Gallery

  2. Festivals/Public Events

  3. Private/Corporate Relationships

  4. Workshops/Mentoring 

To date (not including the countless murals created through our mentorship programming), the project has created over 20 works of public art internationally,  in collaboration with 250+ artists from backgrounds including graphic novels, graffiti and street art, tattoo, illustration, design and the fine arts.