NOHO — Before artist Joséphine Dubern had children, she saw many sunrises following nights filled with brushstrokes on canvas.
The Canada-based Dubern — originally from France — works from a studio in the basement of Montreal’s St. Denis Church, her home parish.
But now she can’t keep painting until dawn. After a couple of hours, she must set her brushes aside to be home with her husband, Louis Roy, their son, Odilon, 3, and their 1-year-old daughter, Jeanne-Mance.
“It’s not easy,” Dubern said. “The time for creating is very short. Right now, it’s two hours that I have.”
But, she noted, “I choose to be a mom and a wife first.”
Still, motherhood is a thread linking her household to her finished works in oil, acrylic, and watercolor.
Last month, Dubern shared nearly two dozen maternal-themed abstract pieces to form the exhibit “Becoming Becoming,” presented by Arthouse2B at the Sheen Center for Thought & Culture in the NoHo neighborhood of Lower Manhattan.
On the final day, Dubern spoke with The Tablet about how having a family inspires her work. Painting and mothering, she explained, feed each other.
“Both are very related,” Dubern said. “Being a mom needs passion, and a lot of other adjectives. And I feel, as a mother, this experience of being a painter is more profound; the paintings are more profound.”
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Dubern was born in 1995 in Southern France’s Aix-en-Provence. She proudly added that her hometown is the birthplace of painter Paul Cézanne (1839-1906), who became famous in the U.S., but largely unknown back home.
After studying communications in Montreal, Dubern returned home to France to learn about art at the Museum of Beaux-Arts in Marseille.
She returned to Montreal as a painter and met her future husband, also an artist, at church.
Dubern said her work is inspired by Christian mysticism and monastic life. Her goal is to share her faith through her art. She said that she begins each painting with a prayer, but she considers the work a prayer unto itself.
“This is where it’s a meeting with God,” Dubern said. “This is why I need a silent studio in a church where God is there.”
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Dubern said she strives to connect with artists who also aspire to glorify God, which is how she met Erin McAtee, co-founder of Arthouse2B.
McAtee, a visual artist, and Claire Kretzschmar, a ballet dancer, formed Arthouse2B in Harlem during the pandemic. They aimed to connect locked-down artists, dancers, and other creatives with venues like the Sheen Center to continue their work and develop spiritual fellowship.
Dubern said she followed Arthouse2B on social media and invited McAtee to visit her studio in Montreal. They began collaborating, and the “Becoming Becoming” exhibition was born.
“I very much feel that the Holy Spirit and the Blessed Mother made this connection happen,” McAtee said. “Seeing Joséphine’s witness as a mother and an artist and seeing the beauty of those two vocations so deeply connected in her life was inspiring enough for me to consider hosting a solo exhibition of her work.
“It felt important to be able to really support an artist who’s speaking with a unique voice that God has given, and who is also living a life of deep faith while creating excellent work that really touches people.”
Dubern’s abstract work generally has no discernible faces or figures. Instead, her inspiration provides themes that she illustrates by melding vibrant colors.
“I paint a lot by intuition,” she said, “but I see I’m not alone. Mary, as a mother, is very present in my work. I see it sometimes in the presence of the colors.”
Dubern noted that blue, a color often associated with Mary, is especially powerful in her paintings.
“When it’s there,” she said, “the presence of Mary is there.”