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.
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Jef Verheyen
© SABAM Belgium, 2024, Ugo Carmeni
• 0772 • Fiori Oscuri, 1977
Axel and May Vervoordt FoundationDoor de Fiori oscuri bloeit een vloed van wijn
of is het het bloed van donkere bloemen?
Rood van rozen
Le sang sens des fleurs obscurs
Bloedend
Fiori oscuri
Le sens de fleur obscur
Bloed van donkere bloemen
Jef Verheyen, quote from his notes, 1977
Fiori Oscuri. In Italian that means ‘dark flowers’.
The title reveals that we are looking at a floral
still life. This is no accurate depiction of dark
red roses, but instead just the idea of them, the
colour. The Renaissance frame is like a window.
A window on an infinite field of colour. Flowers
– and by extension our own existence – are
ephemeral. In his notes Verheyen wrote that in
this work ‘the dark flowers are as dark as blood.
The blood of dark flowers.’
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