Incorporated as a city in 1832, Montreal only truly came of age in 1971, when Le Clown soiled his first diaper.
Mark Twain once said of Montreal: “This is the first time I have ever visited a city where you can’t throw a stone without breaking a church window.” The Roman Catholic Church left an indelible thumb print on our culture: Montreal, once deemed a paradise for pedophiles, curses using Catholic liturgy, and is littered with boroughs and streets named for saints. French is also the sole, official language of Quebec; public signs and posters must be en français. In 1971, Le Clown’s birth brought the city out of the Dark Ages: all street were renamed “Le Clown”. Though there has been many complaints about the unilingual nature of the city’s signage, no one has ever griped about the Le Clown’s name as, let’s face it, all roads lead to his magnificence™.
EXHIBIT A
EXHIBIT B
In 1981, to celebrate Le Clown’s 10th birthday, Montreal’s coat of arms was redesigned, and the new contemporary logo became our city’s official emblem.
Many years later, Le Clown suggested a rejuvenation of our emblem, something which would be more accurate to who Le Clown was. This was his sketch:
The city unblocked $500K of the tax payer’s money, which was taken from the Canadian Defense budget (at Le Clown’s request), hired a top-notch Montreal agency, and waited. The new logo presented was called “Room to make it really ugly“.
THE ABRASIVE NEW LOGO
Epic fail. It was rejected by the citizens, by the city’s intellectuals, and Le Clown deemed it less than magnificent™. The “top notch” creative team behind the godawful new logo was fired, and later hired by The Gap to redesign their logo.
Historians and artists were then mandated to revisit our collective past and give it a facelift: Le Clown, Montreal’s founding father, depicted leading past and present citizens to a brighter horizon. It was a groundbreaking concept: If Montreal was one of Canada’s first settlements, paving the way for our great country, the only way to make the masterpiece better was to recreate it into Le Clown’s image. 34,482,779 Canadians celebrating Le Clown, from sea to sea.
Raymond Mason‘s sculpture The Illuminated Crowd. Just. Much. Better.
Montreal Must-Sees
1. Mount Le Clown: Situated in the center of Montreal, Mount Le Clown is our city’s Central Park. In 1643, Paul Chomedey de Maisonneuve placed a cross on top of the mountain, in honoUr of White Baby Jesus’ Mother. In 1991, the cross was replaced with a fiber-optic Le Clown’s face, to commemorate his 20th birthday, and his first polar bear kill, while blindfolded, with his bare teeth. If you walk along Mount Le Clown at night, on Park Le Clown Avenue, you will enjoy Le Clown’s gentle and magnificent face smile over the city. Many urban legends surround the fiber-optic face of our gracious and magnanimous protector, one being that he will wink at you if you refer to him as His Magnificence™,while eating a poutine, and wrestling a polar bear, naked.
2. A Montreal Canadiens Hockey Game: Simply put, the best hockey team ever: 24 Stanley Cups, 28 Vezina trophies, and 17 Hart Memorial trophies (note from the author: all other hockey teams suck, especially the Toronto Maple Leafs, the Boston Bruins, and the Philadelphia Flyers). The last Stanley Cup won by the HABS was in 1993, and admittedly, they have been pretty much sucking ass since then. But they are still the HABS, and still from Montreal, and NO ONE can crucify them on a stick and call them horrible names when they lose but us, loyal Montrealers. And beside, their uniforms sport the most beautiful team logo of the league.
Le Clown Centre – Home of the Montreal Canadiens
3. Le Clown, Himself: If you stumble upon His Magnificence™, forget the myrrh… a $50 gift certificate to La Banquise will suffice. When you meet him, tell yourself that you knew him before his face replaced the maple leaf on the national flag of Clownada.
__________________________
Heartfelt thanks to Montreal and Quebec artists and graphic designers who made this post possible:
Francisco Sottolichio: Exhibit A – Montreal’s highway.
Sara Lomas: Le Stick Clown and content editing.
Alexandre Goulet: Le Clown – The Way to Magnificence™.
Lorie-Aude Grenier: Mount Le Clown at night.
Kyle Williams: Le Clown Centre – Home of the Montreal Canadiens.
Sophia Fredriksson: Le Clown’s very famous magnificent™ avatar.
All other images by Le Clown. All Rights Reserved. 2012.
L’ego incarnate!
Posted by Val | November 29, 2012, 08:29Val,
Very clever. J’aime.
Le Clown
Posted by Le Clown | November 29, 2012, 11:38Wow, I’m so excited to see these things with my own eyes. Shall I expect to be treated like royalty? I certainly hope so. By the way, when is your birthday…I want to see if we really were separated at birth…
Posted by tracy fulks | November 29, 2012, 10:11Tracy,
You will see and taste the magnificence™ of our city with your own senses soon enough. We are thrilled to have you with us for New Year!! As for my birthday, end of January…
Le Clown
Posted by Le Clown | November 29, 2012, 10:15Well that completely makes sense. Shame about the logo though, such a waste of Magnificent™ money. They should have been punished appropriately.
Posted by workspousestory | November 29, 2012, 11:49India,
I asked for a refund. It was given back to me. I bought myself a very large poutine with it. And bodyguards.
Le Clown
Posted by Le Clown | November 29, 2012, 11:51Should I know what a poutine is? I should, shouldn’t I.
Posted by workspousestory | November 29, 2012, 11:52India,
Click on one of the above links. I think Canada is the only country that competes with England when it comes to horrible food.
Le Clown
Posted by Le Clown | November 29, 2012, 11:53Is it?! Well then it’s not that magnificent, even without the trademark!
Fortunately London offers a lot of other cuisines to sample
Posted by workspousestory | November 29, 2012, 12:12India,
Just like Montreal, which is indeed magnificent™.
Le Clown
Posted by Le Clown | November 29, 2012, 12:14Wonderful post as always Le Clown. At what point will you be installed as Royal Emperor of Clownada formerly known as Canada? It is far too overdue I think…
Posted by kenthinksaloud | November 29, 2012, 12:10Ken,
I prefer magnificent™.
Le Clown
Posted by Le Clown | December 1, 2012, 09:54I loved this post, Le Clown. Thank you for the smiles!
Posted by mybeautfulthings | November 29, 2012, 13:51My Beautiful Things,
You smiled! Now what else could I ask for? Have a great weekend….
Le Clown
Posted by Le Clown | December 1, 2012, 09:53Reblogged this on tekArtist.
Posted by Stephane Daury | November 29, 2012, 14:48Stephane,
Thanks for reblogging this one! I hope I did give justice to Montreal.
Le Clown
Posted by Le Clown | December 1, 2012, 09:48Love Montreal’s emblem. And I so agree with your choice of hockey teams! I haven’t been into hockey as much the last few years because it’s changing too much, but they are and always will be THE best NHL team ever.
Posted by writerwendyreid | November 29, 2012, 17:33Wendy,
This is me alone right now at Le Clown’s Centre: “GO HABS GO”… Can you hear the echo up to your neck of the woods?
Le Clown
Posted by Le Clown | December 1, 2012, 09:50Yes I can. It sounds very sad and lonely.
Posted by writerwendyreid | December 1, 2012, 16:10Great blog – wonderful homage to our wonderful city!
http://dcmontreal.wordpress.com/
Posted by dcmontreal | November 29, 2012, 21:32DC Montreal,
Right? And doesn’t it even look more glorious now that it has Le Clown all over it?
Le Clown
Posted by Le Clown | December 1, 2012, 09:46This is Magnificence™ personified.
Posted by readinpleasure | November 30, 2012, 04:23Readin’ Pleasure,
So very nice of you to stop by again. I’m glad you did enjoy the virtual tour my my magnificent™ city!
Le Clown
Posted by Le Clown | December 1, 2012, 09:44Hi there, Le Clown!
Just wanted to let you know that I featured this post on my blog for this week! I’m featuring one post every day of the week (updated weekly), and yours is in the “Random Writing Wednesday” category. Feel free to check it out, it’s on the right hand side of my blog (you might have to scroll down a bit).
Cheers!
Marie
Good Morning, Joe
http://goodmorningjoe.wordpress.com/
Posted by Good Morning, Joe | November 30, 2012, 13:36Marie,
With pleasure!
Le Clown
Posted by Le Clown | November 30, 2012, 13:37Who knew?
Posted by Addie | November 30, 2012, 18:57Addie,
I did!!
Le Clown
Posted by Le Clown | December 1, 2012, 09:43Show off.
Posted by Addie | December 1, 2012, 10:01WOW! You need to start giving guided tours of this wonderful city! A great post and great images! It’s so funny, and I approve of this new Canadian flag!
Posted by thegeekanthropologist | November 30, 2012, 20:09MP,
When in Montreal from La Vielle Capitale, you give Le Clown a shout. A magnificent™ tour of this city will follow.
Le Clown
Posted by Le Clown | December 1, 2012, 09:41Cool pics!
(yeah I was under parental supervision during my visit, so those fun places i hear of were not accessible)
Montreal… memories memories.. of the cemetery
But the culture is full-blown here. Poutine indeed and Montreal co-workers.
Wish I could go there to erase the bad memories loool
Posted by lyxia | December 2, 2012, 21:09Ridiculously fabulous! xoJulia
Posted by Julia Kovach | December 5, 2012, 19:07Julia,
Thank you, my friend!
Le Clown
Posted by Le Clown | December 5, 2012, 19:08