Jef Verheyen

The Belgian ZERO artist Jef Verheyen (1932-1984) became known as the painter of light streams and colour spectra. He experimented not only with light, but also with movement and the invisible as means to evoke natural mechanisms and to reveal universal interrelationships between human beings and the surrounding world. He used geometric principles – his passion for geometry was born out of his interest in mathematics and (Greek) philosophy – as the basis for harmony. Verheyen never gave up on traditional media and materials such as the canvas, paint, and brushes to search for the essence of our nature.

Jef Verheyen

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• 0262 • L’Or – Aarde – Permeke (Gold – Earth – Permeke), 1976

Private collection, Belgium

Painting , 130 x 130 cm

Matt lacquer on canvas

In paintings such as Zwarte Zomer (Black

Summer) and Permeke, Jef Verheyen paints his

perception of the Flemish atmosphere, which is

rather dark. Later in the 1960s, he travels to Brazil,

Mexico, Tunisia, Spain, Italy and France in search

of light, which is everywhere different.

A northerner in search of southern light: Vincent

van Gogh went on the same quest before him.

In a letter written in Provence in 1889, Van Gogh

writes to his brother about the southern light:

‘Perhaps my journey into the south will bear

fruit, however, because the difference of the

stronger light, the blue sky, teaches one to see,

but especially and only if one looks at it for a long

time. (…) one must first and gradually accustom

one’s eyes to the different light.’

During his travels, Verheyen also writes in

his letters about the enchantment of the light.

‘Everything shimmers here!’ He tries to render

the essence of those impressions on canvas.

References

Jef Verheyen : Retrospectieve / K.J. Geirlandt. - Brussel : Vereniging voor Tentoonstellingen van het Paleis voor Schone Kunsten, 1979. - : ill. ; 29,5 x 21 cm

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