The Restaurant La Table des Ancêtres will host an exhibition of paintings by well-known local artist Luc Dugas.

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THE SEA WAS ALWAYS IN US / Exhibit

This exhibit will be presented this season in the Lobster Hatchery. It portrays the evolution of the fishing trade in the Bay of Chaleur. This exhibit will display the works of artist-painter Michel Duguay.

Even though the fur trade and the search for lucrative beaver pelts provided the original impetus for exploration and colonization on the vast North American continent, it was the humble but much more abundant animal that drew the first Europeans to the New World; banks were teeming with cod fish off of Newfoundland, Acadia, and the Gulf of St. Lawrence.

The Sea was always in us tells a story, a story of fishing and fishers. Through words and images, portraying the passage of time and the seasons, whether on the open sea or along the shore. It is also the story of a region, that of the Acadian Peninsula, which pushes out into the sea like the prows of the schooners of old.

The story is revealed on large-format panels (3 triangular units with a total of 9 panels, each measuring approximately 3.5 metres in length by 4 metres high). Visitors are able to wander among the panels and travel back in time to an era when fishing was the mainstay of Acadian life, a time when living was synonymous with fishing.

The story is told through evocative themes that detail the various aspects of the fishing trade, such as “Season to Season: Blessing to Dredging”, “From Sea to Shore: Flakes and Factory Girls”, “Tools of the trade”, “Caulking the Seams: From dories to schooners”, “The Factries”, and “The sea was with us”. Other themes explain how people who made their living from the sea and its moods learned to co-exist with it, and how, at the beginning of the 19^th century, the craze for lobster gave rise to a whole network of “factories” in the towns and villages that dotted the coastline. The story also tells how the sea from which subsistence was drawn, the sea that enabled many families to survive the Great Depression, could sometimes turn into the most pitiless of adversaries when storms blew in.

A short film based on a documentary shot in the Lamèque area more than fifty years ago contains images from the Escuminac Disaster showing a village scarred by a terrible maritime tragedy and adding a very human dimension to the written texts.

This exhibit, which is a joint project between the Provincial Archives of New Brunswick and the Village historique acadien, was designed and mounted using photographs and documents preserved by the Provincial Archives and artifacts from the Village Historique Acadien. You are invited to explore the dynamic lifestyle and fascinating history of these steadfast and determined people for whom, over the centuries, the sea was both life-giver and life-taker. As you are about to discover, the sea was truly always in these people. 

Celebration of provincial heritage at VHA

The annual New Brunswick Heritage Fairs Provincial Showcase will be officially launched on Sunday, June 27, at the Village Historique Acadien. Wellness, Culture and Sport Minister Hédard Albert made the announcement.

New Brunswick's Heritage Fairs Program is a provincial initiative of Heritage Branch of the Department of Wellness, Culture and Sport.

All projects will be on exhibit at the Village Historique Acadien from Monday, June 21, to Saturday, July 24.

For more information, see Press releases section.