The First Jewel is a sculpture installed in the rose garden at the Botanical Garden of Montréal. This full-round bronze covered with a dark patina portrays a bare-chested young woman wearing a scarf on her head and a draped piece of fabric serving as a dress. Her bent arms held in front of her originally held a pearl necklace between the two hands. Whereas the figure’s skin is quite textured, the fabrics are smooth and realistically rendered.

In this work, the dream world and reality come together in a figure who doesn’t show obvious emotion but is lost in her dreams. Winant’s sculpture thus expresses the moments of reflection that punctuate and brighten up everyday reality.

The work is exemplary of Winant’s early creative period, in which her bronzes often portrayed figures linked to family, many of them female and dressed in draped fabric. Like the figure in The First Jewel, these figures do not have very expressive faces but exude a sense of peace and tranquillity.

After she had exhibitions at the Dominion Gallery and the Four Seasons Hotel, The First Jewel was installed on the terrace at city hall, at the request of Montréal mayor Jean Drapeau, in 1980. After Winant died, in 1989, her heirs offered the artwork as a gift in memory of the artist to the Ville de Montréal, which gave it a permanent home in the Botanical Garden.