Born
- Balmoral, New Brunswick
Originally from Balmoral, Gilbert LeBlanc has been a professional sculptor in LaPlante NB since 1981. He first became interested in the visual arts in high school, when they were taught for the first time. Although passionate about art, Gilbert didn't see it as a breadwinner and enrolled in architecture at the N.B.I.T. in Moncton. Seeing that in the workplace architecture was not enough to satisfy his need to create, he traveled and discovered the importance of art elsewhere. When he returned to Acadia, he trained in wood sculpture at the C.C.N.B. in Bathurst from 1980 to 1982. Even before his 2nd year at the college, Gilbert was determined to make a living out of it. He opened a joint workshop with a cabinetmaker and sculptor, helped organize craft shows and a crafts co-op, and became founding president of the Association des métiers d'art acadiens. He exhibits woodwork several times a year, and experiments with stone, fiberglass, steel and silver jewelry.
LeBlanc complements his training with travel and a number of workshops, then shares what he has learned by teaching courses himself. As a child, he had admired his father forging steel. Metalworking fascinated him, and in 1992 he took a course in art foundry with Clair Brunet at the Ontario College of Art and Design. Soon after, he set up one of the first art foundries in the Maritimes. He produces his own bronze sculptures and makes foundry art accessible to other NB artists.
Gilbert LeBlanc's work has been exhibited mainly in New Brunswick, although his sculptures have been seen in group exhibitions around the world.