Jacques VAN DER VAEREN (1939-2004). Harmonie,... - Lot 716 - Les Andelys Enchères

Jacques VAN DER VAEREN (1939-2004). Harmonie, 2000. Relief on wood and oil signed, dated, titled and dedicated on the back "To Jean-Louis and Sylvie wishing them long revisions in the company of Harmonie". 111 x 80.5 cm. Jacques Van der Vaeren admits it himself: since childhood, nothing has ever made him "let go of his pencils and brushes", not even his professional activities, which have given him the opportunity to indulge his curiosity about people, which lies at the heart of his artistic approach. This painter's work is a quest for fusion, "for the other, for all that we are not". He has spent his entire life transcribing onto canvas the "millions of images, emotions and dreams (...) that I have in the back of my mind, that stand out there". Travel. They also shape her artistic expression. Spain, the Maghreb, Black Africa, the Middle East, Asia, South America: Jacques Van der Vaeren has traveled and worked extensively abroad. From each journey, he brings back not only emotions, but also beautiful encounters. This is how he met the painter and sculptor Jorge Soler, who encouraged him to exhibit his work from 1995 onwards. He then gave up all professional activity to devote himself to his painting. The mystery. Until 2003, the artist took part in over a hundred solo and group exhibitions (in Europe, Asia and the United States) and produced almost half a thousand works, all reflections of a dreamlike vision, shrouded in sensuality and mystery (the exhibition at Galerie Marianne is entitled Mémoires secrètes). To achieve this, he uses oil and very often natural elements, "a sea of diluted pigments". The richness of his canvases stems from the interplay of opposites: full and empty, fire and black, man and woman, light and shadow, softness and harshness, smooth and grainy. And the signs and symbols - crosses, circles, lines - that punctuate his pictorial expression add to this mysterious language.