Chris: But what about Eaux vives? They set it up like it was a theme show, and I'm certain that there is stuff in there that works within that context. But with a theme you end up saying "no, this one has sand so it shouldn't be in the exhibit." But the curator can come back and say "yeah, sand is on the beach, the beach has an ocean, therefore you get the water and then you get..." I find that very interesting that with Visual Art is assumed that there needs to be some person filtering beforehand.

Michel: Well that's your view. In your gallery, you leave a lot more freedom for the artist, which is good. It makes it an interesting gallery to visit, but I think that it's one of the reasons why you don't get reviews, not because people think its bad art, but because it's not really organized in a way to make the art approachable for reviewers.

Chris: Well, there definitely is no filter. You're coming in, my basic take is that I want the art here to be as immediate as a hit song on the radio.

Michel: Well your position is important, because you're giving a loud voice to these artists who would otherwise have to go through a very annoying call for submissions from all of these other galleries which often makes it impossible for them to get their art seen. Here they have as much space to express themselves, as they should. Getting back to Le Devoir, because it is a newspaper I know a lot of people are going to read what I write. It's not like writing for Parachute or something. Take the Roberto Dutesco article I wrote, I'm like, fine it's not Durer, but I can see why it's interesting, it's on McGill College, people are going to see it, that deserves to be written about, too.

Chris: You're doing your masters, what you're doing your thesis on?

Michel: Identity and politics in 1970's Quebec art, in the setting.

Chris: How much is done, how much longer do you thing it's going to take?

Michel: Another semester. An interesting thesis was written by Louise Vigneault on identity and politics in Quebec art in the 60's, 50's. She was writing about Le refus global, I'm just going to go over that and talk about what was happening in the 70's with conceptual art, video art, feminism, stuff like that, fragmentation.

Chris: How did you end up choosing that?

Michel: Oh it's related to how I feel about Quebec society. I'm Quebecois, but my father is American and my mother is from France and I feel totally Quebecois yet I don't have roots as a Pur Laine so there this question of identity ...and also I like doing art myself, a lot of my art is based on the question of landscape and identity.