Although Patricia Bellerose, a French-Canadian artist from Quebec, has created her fair share of landscapes, she is more intrigued by painting people. Her new exhibit, “Together in Harmony,” is all about music and the people who create it. The exhibit opened at the Lake Placid Center for the Arts gallery on Thursday, July 14.

Bellerose started coming to the area because of the Saranac Lake Plein Air Festival, an art festival where the artists are able to explore and paint outdoors throughout the community.

Bellerose met her husband at the festival, and both share a love of the Adirondacks. She prefers painting people, but has completed landscapes for Gallery 46 and understands visitors wanting to take a piece of the Adirondacks home. Bellerose, herself, continues to return because of her love for Lake Placid, which led to her current exhibit at the LPCA.

“We love the Adirondacks, as soon as I put my feet in here, I just love to come back here,” she said.

Bellerose collaborated with the Lake Placid Sinfonietta for this new exhibit. Their collaboration was supposed to take place in 2020, right as pandemic-related lockdowns and border closures started to happen. Living in Canada, she wasn’t able to come back to Lake Placid for some time, and that delayed the production of her pieces. Unable to immediately incorporate the Sinfonietta, Bellerose changed course.

“It became not just about the Sinfonietta but music at large, you know, so I have a jazz scene at the bottom here, and all the orchestra scenes are up here,” she said, referring to the two levels of the gallery.

Bellerose’s exhibit features a combination of multiple musicians from around the world. The jazz section consists of street musicians and famous names such as Louis Armstrong and Wynton Marsalis, while the upper level is a combination of the Lake Placid Sinfonietta and various classical groups.

Bellerose doesn’t always base her artwork on music and musicians, but she does have a fascination with movement. Before this exhibit, she painted chefs cooking and kitchen scenes, woodworkers and Native American dancers. She likes to always incorporate movement into her work. And though she specializes in movement, Bellerose doesn’t actually paint live.

“I can’t paint somebody who’s moving … so I’m using footage of people, and then I add up the feeling of movement into it,” she said.

Her paintings feel as if the subjects are caught mid-song, still breathing and flowing with the music.

“Together in Harmony” will be on display at the LPCA until Sept. 10.

For more information and gallery hours, visit lakeplacidarts.org.