Images by Allan de la Plante
Photographer; Author; Painter; Keynote Speaker; Member of the Canadian Motorsport Hall of Fame.
Along the Way
Allan de la Plante has won many accolades for his photography of people of action.
In 1970, he began taking portraits of sports personalities, especially those in the world of automobile racing.
In 1974, he covered the Russia-Canada hockey series for the National Sport and Recreation Center. Between 1974 and 1976, he created The First Canadian Gallery of Athletes, a collection of portraits of Canada's top athletes of the time.
In 1976 he was the official Canadian and COJO Photographer at the Montreal Olympic Games.
While de la Plante's summers were spent capturing automobile racing, his winters were spent covering the exciting world of downhill racing during the era of the Crazy Canucks.
In 1978 de la Plante released of his first book, 'Ski Free', with World Freestyle Champion, Greg Athans. Long before then, de la Plante and a fiery young racing driver by the name of Gilles Villeneuve had joined forces and begun work on a book on Grand Prix racing. De la Plante had begun recording Villeneuve's meteoric rise from Formula Atlantic to the ultimate, Formula One. In the fall of 1982, after the untimely death of Villeneuve de la Plante released 'Villeneuve', a photographic essay on his friend's racing life.
1983 saw the release of de la Plante's third book, 'The Complete Gas Bar-B-Q Cookbook' with Joanne Bennett.
Book number four came in 1984 in the form of 'Celebrate Our Faith', the official book on the Canadian tour of Pope John Paul II.
In 1993 'Flame of Courage' was released to great acclaim. The book on the Canadian firefighter was hailed as the definitive book on fire fighting in Canada.
In 1995 'Villeneuve', De la Plante's 1982 book, was reborn as 'Villeneuve a Racing Legend'. This book, coupled with its fully-interactive CD-ROM, became 'the' book on Villeneuve. In 1996 it won the bronze medal in the New Media Invision Awards, a world-wide competition in the publishing industry.
De la Plante's work was recognized by the Government of Canada when Canada Post selected his photographs to be the base in the design of two commemorative stamps in memory of Gilles Villeneuve. The stamps were released in June 12, 1997.
In 2002 de la Plante's next project saw the release of 'Malibu' , Young Life's pictoral history of their beautiful children's camp on the Princess Lousia Inlet north of Vancouver, British Columbia.
'Bowen Reflections' was released in 2004 to great reviews. This David O'Malley design beautifully tells the story of Bowen Island from the 1850's to the mid-sixties. De la Plante directed the project.
While living on the inspiring Bowen Island off the coast of British Columbia, de la Plante completed two novels. Both 'The Summer of Arnie Trout' and 'Heffer's Secret' have found interest in the film industry.
In late 2013 'Villeneuve A Racing Legend' was released as an ebook on Amazon.com Also released on Amazon.com is 'The Summer of Arnie Trout' and was critically acclaimed as a novel with the pace of a Formula One car.
As a keynote speaker, de la Plante delights audiences with his candor, humour and life stories. He has drawn the spotlight many times throughout Canada and Asia. He lives with his family in British Columbia.