This film introduces us to the "automatistes," followers of a form of abstract art that developed in Montréal; a movement initiated by Paul-Émile Borduas. The meaning of the movement is explained by the artists themselves when narrator Bruce Ruddick drops in at their cooperative studio, visits the painter Paterson Ewen at his home and joins the crowd at L'Échouerie, the artists' rendezvous. Dr. Robert Hubbard, chief curator of the National Gallery of Canada, comments on non-objective art in general and automatism in particular.