Rita Letendre (Abenaki/Quedecoise, 1928-2021) was an internationally renowned painter, printmaker and muralist. She began her career in the 1950s in Montreal, working in abstraction and associating with Les Automatistes and Les Plasticiens, often being the only woman in their group exhibitions. Her abstract works employ vibrant oils which suggest movement through repeated geometric shapes. Letendre gradually moved from the looser Automatiste style to the more geometric, hard-edged techniques employed by the Plasticiens. In 1948, Letendre enrolled at the École des Beaux-Arts in Montreal, but did not agree with their strong emphasis on traditional figurative art, which brought her into conversation with Les Automatistes and Les Plasticiens. She caught the attention of the wider Canadian abstract art scene in 1954 when she was included in the Automatiste exhibition La matière chante in 1954. Letendre visited California in the mid-1960s, where she attended the Tamarind Lithography Workshop and produced her first prints in 1965. In 2005, she received the Order of Canada and in 2010, the Governor General’s Award in Visual and Media Arts.