Kaël Mercader

Kaël Mercader’s artistic practice revolves around play, pleasure, and dreams. His vibrant paintings depict characters in motion, set within pastoral and bucolic landscapes. Drawing from his memories, dreams, and the stories of loved ones, Mercader tenderly captures the simple joys of vacations—those precious moments of leisure, relaxation, and carefree living. Like memories altered by the passage of time or distorted through dreams, incongruous and anachronistic elements find their way into these scenes, lending them a touch of strangeness, humor and nostalgia.

Infusing his work with references to art history, Mercader aims to evoke a range of emotions in the viewer, such as laughter, unease, or a sense of déjà vu. A lover of play, movement, and color, and driven by a desire to create “living” paintings, the artist sensitively portrays natural phenomena such as the effects of light and the kinetic energy of animals and plants.

Originally from Quebec City and now based in Montreal, Kaël Mercader was introduced to painting and drawing at a young age by his father, who is also an artist. A multidisciplinary artist, he explores performance, drawing, painting, and sewing, engaging in numerous creative projects both solo and as part of Collectif Ambitieux, an artistic duo he co-founded with Anne-Christine Guy Banet in 2017. In 2018, he was awarded the Videre Relève Prize in visual arts.