Abstract Impressionist Painting On “ineffable” Panel By Pierre Vlerick

Ineffable, 1962 Oil on Masonite panel 91.5 x 61.5 cm (unframed) 93 x 63 cm (framed) Signed and dated upper right 'P. Vlerick 1962' with the title, signature, place and date on the back: Ineffable P. Vlerick Afsnee 1962 The work of Pierre Vlerick bears a certain resemblance to that of Willem de Kooning. While the Dutch American was famous for his wild treatment of the canvas, Pierre Vlerick showed more restraint, but making a painting is inevitably a slow process of stops, starts and revisions. Its exploration is supposed to result in the correct proportion of color fields and streaks, often applied layer by layer. All its colors have a luminous intensity. It was primarily Bonnard's colorful work that inspired Vlerick to compose his own singular color range, consisting of lightly shimmering yellows, greens and oranges and a few touches of blue here and there. The abstraction is emphasized by the use of color. Colors that are not associated with everyday objects generally dominate the composition: purple, for example. This is the basis of his continuous abstraction which results in fields of colors combined with organic elements represented with the vagueest outlines. Although both artists create very metropolitan, even worldly art, their works evoke nature. De Kooning has been called a master of the "abstract landscape". The structure of Vlerick's works is also very vegetal and organic. It’s no wonder he called his paintings “gardens.” Neither artist left his garden empty: de Kooning created a female figure resembling a cross between a prostitute and the mother goddess. Vlerick imagined a woman who enjoys her body. Vlerick's approach to abstract art is the same as that of de Kooning: they refuse to paint in a figurative way, without giving up referring to reality. De Kooning expressed this very well in an interview by admitting that it was absurd (in the post-war period) to still paint the human figure, but asserting that it would be even more absurd not to do so. . The only way out of this ambiguous dilemma is to deconstruct the human figure. Not to reject it, but to show it in all its fragility. Pierre Vlerick's exceptional artistic talents were already recognized during his studies at the Ghent Academy (1940-1944), where he received a gold medal at the end of his studies. In 1947-1948, Vlerick enrolled at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière, a private Parisian academy which attracted many foreign artists thanks to the reputation of its most important teachers such as Maurice Denis (1870-1943). Denis is one of the founding fathers of the "Nabis" and is also considered the godfather of abstract art by many artists and art critics. Maurice Denis is famous for his quote: "Don't forget that a painting, before being any representation, is essentially a flat surface covered with colors in a certain ordered order." At La Grande Chaumière, Vlerick is challenged to develop a pictorial language of his own. Vlerick develops a way of translating observed reality into visions of color and shape, which can be located somewhere on the axis between the figurative and the abstract. Reality is broken down and reconstructed into an entirely new representation. After a trip to Spain in 1955, the painter evolved towards the use of brighter colors. During the 1958 Brussels World's Fair (Expo 58), Vlerick was confronted for the first time with real works by 17 American artists (William Baziotes, James Brooks, Sam Francis, Arshile Gorky, Adolph Gottlieb, Philip Guston, Grace Hartigan , Franz Kline, Willem de Kooning, Robert Motherwell, Barnett Newman, Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko, Theodoros Stamos, Clyfford Still, Bradley Walker Tomlin and Jack Tworkov) and he is deeply impressed by them. This event pushed him even further in the direction of abstraction and, from 1959, Pierre Vlerick evolved radically towards lyrical abstraction. His abstract paintings from the first half of the 1960s are experimental and raw in their treatment of space and surface, and mesmerizing in their use of dazzling color. In the early 1960s, the artist began to exhibit abstract impressionist works in international exhibitions such as the Carnegie Institute (Pittsburgh 1961/1962), Corcoran Gallery (Washington DC1963), Venice Biennale (Belgian Pavilion) (Venice 1964) and the Musea de Arte Moderna (Rio de Janeiro 1965). Vlerick obtained a Fulbright scholarship which allowed him to stay in the United States in 1964 and 1968. He also taught at Harvard University in Boston. At the same time, Vlerick collaborated in curating the Forum exhibitions in Ghent in 1961-62-63, where the European avant-garde was widely represented. This allows him to be in close contact with artists and their ideas. His work has remained very personal and original, which is to his credit. Vlerick's work is far removed from the explicitness of expressionism, the sharp delineations of surrealism, the angular multi-perspectives of cubism or the cold rationality of conceptualism. It is closer to the myopic world view typical of an impressionist's observation and representation of the world. The way in which he lets the bright colors fertilize each other is not very far from Fauvism. And with Lyrical Abstraction, he has the nerve to let the compositions get carried away. One thing is certain: he belongs to a generation after 1945 who did not want to bend to the constraints of a style.