Les Automatists

Les Automatistes were a group of Canadian artists influenced by Surrealism and its theory of automatism, which involves spontaneous production. Through this way they wanted to express the creative power of the subconscious in art. This led to the use of intuitive methods of applying art, such as with the fingers or blindfolded. Soon, Les Automatistes gained an international stage, and they also influenced other art forms besides painting such as poetry and dance. They used a colorful, flowing, abstract technique. This contrasted with the hard-edge abstraction popular in the United States and Europe at the time. They were eager to discover a Canadian artistic identity.