Jef Verheyen

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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 - Window on Infinity

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(c)Jef Verheyen, scan: CKV, 2019 - Jef Verheyen Archive
• 0198 • Gouden Rook - I x I = I, 1960-1961
Jef Verheyen Archive
Painting , 130 x 95 cm
oil paint and gold pigment on canvas

After a few years of experimentation with ceramics, in 1956 Verheyen again begins to paint. New abstract work in warm colours and translucent tints. Gradually, the informal composition of planes makes way for a monochrome continuum with subtle differences of tone. Not an evocation of a landscape; instead, more comparable to a moment in a philosophical investigation into the essence of things. At once sensitive and mysterious, like the misty twilight so often evoked by painters and poets from our clime as consonant expression of human shortcomings.

References

  • Retrospectieve Jef Verheyen, 1932-1984 / Willy Van den Bussche & Léonore Verheyen. - Oostende/Brugge : Provinciaal Museum voor Moderne Kunst/Stichting Kunstboek, 1994. - 158 p. : ill. ; 30 x 24.5 cm

  • 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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