(updated on February 20th 2021)
For more than 60 years, Pierre Hébert has been waging a career as a filmmaker and a visual artist.
As he was pursuing studies in Anthropology at Universit of Montreal, in 1962, Pierre hébert directs his first films and meet Norman McLaren, a determining encounter that will shape the rest of his life, who will encourage him to continue his early experiments in scratchin directly on film, a technique thatwill remain a central axis of his work.
In 1965, he is hired by the National film Board of Canada, first in the animation studion of the English program and then, from 1969, in the Franch Program studio.
Between 1965 and 1971, he directs a series of experimental abstract films that explore phenomenons of perception (Op hop, Opus 3, Autour de la perception, Fundamentals of genetics). Later on, his films will be characterized by social and political concerns, while continuing to have an experimental outlook (Entre chiens et loup, Memories of war). From 1982, his production will be linked to multidisciplinary performances with musicians, choreographers and writers. In 1986, he invents an unusual form of performance (direct improvised animation engraved on film while the projector is running) that will be performed in many countries.
In 1991, he starts working on his first feature lenght movie, a France-Canada coproduction ((La Plante humaine, Sodec AQCC Prize for the best Feature film of the year, 1996) that is released in move theater in Mntreal and Paris. In 1996, he becomes director of the French Program animation studio. In 1999, he becomes an independant filmmmaker.
In 2001, with American musician Bob Ostertag, he continue his improvised animation venture under a renewded guize with the use of computers ( the Living Cinema project) wich will bring him in Europe, in the Middle East, in Asia and in Noth and South America. Afterward, he continue to perform in solo and with other musicians (49 Flies, Tropisms, Only the hand…).
In 2005, as an extention of his perfromances, the Places and monuments projects begins to slowly take the center of his work. Suported by the prestigious csareer grant of the Conseil des Arts et des lettres du Québec in 2012, he develops a series that will include several films and video installations : Berlin – The Passage of time(2014) et Cycling Utrecht (2015) that will receive international attention, amongs others at Forum des images in Paris and at the Holland Animation Film Festival in the Nederlands. With his perfromance Rolling over Blinkity Blank, he resumes scratching on film, after an interruption of ten years, while continuing the Places and monuments project with two new feature length film, Bazin’s film (2017) and Mt Fuji seen from a moving train (2021). His scratched animation work will culminate in his last opus Prelude and Fugues – The wood Thrush (2025)
Meanwhile, Pierre Hébert pursue a constant production of drawings that are exhibited in Quebec and France (like at the Annecy Museum-Castle). In 2015, he starts the Heads project that consists in posting in line one new head drawing every day during a full year.The project will result in a book (Heads, Éditions de l’œil, France, 2017)
He is the author of three essays about animation cinema (Toucher au cinéma (Éd. Somme toute, 2021), Corps, langage, technologie (Éd. Les 400 coups, 2006) et L’Ange et l’automate (Éd. Les 400 coups,1999). He is also member of the publishing commitee of different specialized magazines (Format Cinéma, 1983-86, Objectif, 1964-67…) and writes in many others (24 images et Blink Blank). He takes part in conferences and seminars (for example, in 2018, with professor André Habib, in a creation/research seminar at the summer school of University of Montreal) he also teaches the technique and history of animation at University of Montreal (1975-78), at Laval University(Québec city, 1974-78) and at the Fine Art school of Montreal (1968).
Président of the board at Cinémathèque québécoise from 1993 to 1995, he will later be member of the board of the artists run center Vidéographe, from 2011 to 2021. All of his later films, from 2000, are dsitributed by Vidéographe.
Rewarded several times for life time achievement, Pierre Hébert has received , in 2024, the René-Jodoin Award given by les Sommets du cinéma d’animation and an honor Cristal by The iInternational Animation Festival in Annecy. In 2018, he reeived an honorary doctorate from the Emily Carr University of Art and Design in Vancouver, and in 2017, a special award by the Tehran Animation Festival. The prestigious Albert-Tessier Quebec Governement Award for cinema is given to him in 2004, and the McLaren Heritage Award in 1988, and the Melkweg Cinema Award for Reality Research, in Amsterdam, in 1986.
Awards and important grants
- 2024- Cristal d’honneur awarded by The Annecy International Animation Festival, for sixty years of innovative animation.
- 2024- René Jodoin Award for an exceptionnal contribution to canadian animation, given by Les sommets du cinéma d’animation.
- 2022- he becomes member of the Academy of Motion Picture Art and Science.
- 2018- Honorary Doctorate by the Emily Carr University of Art and Design in Vancouver.
- 2017- Special career award from the Tehran International Animation Festival given by M. R. Karimi Saremi, director of the festival.
- 2016- Production grant by Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec for the film «Le film de Bazin»
- 2014- Best Canadian Animation Film award at Les Sommets du cinéma d’animation, in Montréal, for You look like me.
- 2012- Cinema Career grant (100000$) given by CALQ (Art Council of Quebec) for pursuing the «Places and Monuments» project
- 2011- Production grant by CALQ (Art Council of Quebec) for the film «Place Carnot-Lyon» (Places and Monuments-2)
- 2005- Production grant by the Canada Council for the Arts for the film «Herqueville».
- 2004- Albert Tessier award (Quebec Goverment award for cinema) for life time achievement
- 2004- Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec award for Between Science and Garbage.
- 1997- AQCC/SODEC award for the best Quebec feature in 1996 for La Plante humaine.
- 1997- Office des communications sociales cinema award for La Plante humaine.
- 1993- AQEC/Olivieri award for the best theoritical writing on cinema.
- 1988- First recipient of the Norman McLaren Heritage Award for life time achievement
- 1987- Bessy Award (NewYork Dance and Performance Award) for the films in the dance show The Technology of Tears.
- 1986- Melkweg Cinema Award for Reality Research (décerné par le Melkweg Cinema in Amsterdam) for life time achievement.
- 1985- Best Quebec short film Award given by l’Association québécoise des critiques.de cinéma to Songs and Dances of the unanimated world-the subway.
Here is a complete curriculum vitae.
Here is a short biography.