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.
This deep red painting is Verheyen’s first
successful monochrome experiment. The floating
half arc blends into the background, making
way for a meditative red. In 1958 this work is
exhibited for the first and last time, at the
G58 exhibition in the Hessenhuis, in Antwerp.
Verheyen’s Italian friend and mentor Lucio
Fontana acquires the painting.
This is the first time that the Fondazione
Lucio Fontana has loaned the work. After more
than 60 years, it is back in Antwerp.