Mélanie has seductive blue eyes and a refreshing wintery face. It was inevitable that the painting was going to reflect a cool theme. It is for this reason that I asked her to wear her blue tuque and placed her in front of a blue brick background. Mélanie has french-canadian and german roots. It's the strangest thing, but when she smiles, it brings out her "joie de vivre" french-canadian face, and when she doesn't, it brings out her more stoic german face. I like both faces, they're equally beautiful, but as usual, as in most of my paintings, I chose the more stoic one.

This painting will always hold a special place among my subway series paintings because it was partly completed in the windows of a large department store in Montreal. As part of a month long campaign to promote the arts, The Hudson's Bay Company Department Store approached me about working on a painting inside the store windows. With the store windows open, people were able to stop, take a look, and talk with me as I worked on the painting. People loved the idea. I loved the idea as well. It was an unforgettable experience. I wished it could have lasted longer.