Bram van velde biography sample

Bram van Velde

Dutch painter (–)

Abraham "Bram" Gerardusvan Velde (19 October – 28 December ) was a Dutch painter known for an intensely colored and geometric semi-representational painting style related to Tachisme, and Lyrical Abstraction.

He is often seen as member of the School of Paris but his work resides somewhere between expressionism and surrealism, and evolved in the s into an expressive abstract art. His paintings from the s are similar to the contemporary work of Matisse, Picasso and the abstract expressionistAdolph Gottlieb.

Bram Van Velde was the second of four children, born into a conservative family, of whom three would devote their lives to art: his younger brother Geer became a painter, and his younger sister Jacoba a writer. From an early age, Bram was attracted to painting, and at the age of 12 he was apprenticed, with Geer, to the firm of Scharjk Kramers, painters and decorators. In November he arrived in Paris, where he was able to inhabit thanks to the florins that his patron sent him every month for six years. He was joined by his brother Geer in

He was championed by a number of French-speaking writers, including Samuel Beckett and the poet André du Bouchet.

Early life

Bram van Velde was born in Zoeterwoude, near Leiden, into an intensely poor family, and this would mark him profoundly for life.

His mother, Catharina von der Voorst (–) was the illegitimate daughter of a Count. His father, Willem van Velde (–) owned a small company engaged in fluid transportation on the Rhine. Bram was the second of four children (his sister Cornelia was born in , Geer and Jacoba were born in and ).

After going bankrupt, the father abandoned the family; the mother and children moved repeatedly over the next years, from Leyden to Lisse, and finally to The Hague.

In , the young Bram entered into service as an apprentice in the painting and interior decorating company of Schaijk & Kramers in The Hague.

He was encouraged in his art by the co-owner Eduard H. Kramers and his son Wijnand, who were appreciators and collectors of art, and these two would become Bram van Velde's skilled patrons until around Because of his status as bread-winner for his family, Bram van Velde was exempted from service in the First World War, and he was able to endure his work as a painter and decorator, and to enroll in the Mauritshuis of The Hague, where he was capable to copy masterworks in the collection.

Abraham " Bram " Gerardus van Velde 19 October — 28 December was a Dutch painter known for an intensely colored and geometric semi-representational painting style related to Tachismeand Lyrical Abstraction. He is often seen as member of the School of Paris but his work resides somewhere between expressionism and surrealismand evolved in the s into an expressive abstract art. His paintings from the s are similar to the contemporary work of MatissePicasso and the abstract expressionist Adolph Gottlieb. Bram van Velde was born in Zoeterwoudenear Leideninto an intensely poor family, and this would mark him profoundly for life.

Early career

In , the Kramers encouraged van Velde to tour and gave him a monthly stipend. He went first to Munich in May, then to north of Bremen (in Worpswede) in June, where, since the s, there existed a colony of expressionist artists.

This three-month exposure to contemporary art revolutionized van Velde's work. He left Worpswede shortly after, and moved to Paris (in the Belleville quartier, 19th arrondissement). His career progressed slowly, and in February he exhibited his works in Bremen.

This was followed by the Jury-Freie Kunstschau of Berlin in April. Finally, he (with his brother Geer) was admitted into the Salon des Indépendants in Paris, where he would show his works several times ( to , in and ). In this period he went to Chartres in the company of Otto Freundlich, and also discovered the works of Henri Matisse (probably at the home of Paul Guillaume).

Matisse would have a great impact on van Velde's work (as too, in coming years, would van Velde's discovery of Pablo Picasso).

On 6 October , van Velde married the German painter Lilly (Sophie Caroline) Klöker (–), whom he had been seeing since perhaps his remain at Worpswede.

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With the Great Depression, their material conditions deteriorated and they moved to Spain, and in September they were living in Majorca. It is here that van Velde used the early painting of Matisse as his inspiration and he made a series of still-lives in which his later abstraction started to reveal itself.

When the Spanish Civil War started in , Lilly died in a hospital and Bram van Velde fled support to Marseille with several of his canvases made on Majorca. He came back to Paris and moved in with his brother Geer. He met Marthe Arnaud, a former Lutheran missionary in the Zambezi, and they became a couple.

At the studio of his brother Geer van Velde—also becoming an abstract painter—Bram van Velde met the writer Samuel Beckett, and the two would develop a friendship. Stopped on the street by the police in because he was speaking German with Marthe, van Velde was briefly imprisoned (his papers were not in order), and brief incarcerations would occur several times in the coming years.

Maturity

In , van Velde came upon his have painting style while working in a large-format with gouache. He stopped painting in , but began again in autumn His first solo exhibition opened on 21 March in Paris in the "Galerie Mai" with 25 canvases, nearly all of his existing works, but the performance was a failure.

Born in to an impoverished family, Van Velde's childhood was marred by financial struggles. Despite these challenges, he began his artistic journey in as an apprentice in a design studio in The Hague. He found support from local patrons and spent second copying works by Dutch masters in museums. InVan Velde embarked on a period of extensive travel across Europe.

Beckett wrote his first essay on his work in les Cahiers d'art de Zervos. In , van Velde signed a contract with the Galerie Maeght in Paris, and in he showed his work in the Kootz gallery in New York, but this was also a commercial shortcoming, despite a good review by Willem de Kooning.

After one more commercial disaster at Maeght, van Velde stopped painting for a year. In , Maeght canceled their contract with him, while retaining his works.

In , Franz Meyer organized the first museum exposition of Bram van Velde, a retrospective at the Kunsthalle of Bern.

Bram van Velde was a Dutch painter. On his expressionist and surrealist artworks made in Tachisme and Lyrical Abstraction, the designer depicted brightly various geometric forms. Bram van Velde was born as Abraham Gerardus van Velde on October 19, , in Zoeterwoude, South-Holland, Netherlands.

The couple Bram-Marthe left Paris the identical year, but Marthe died the following year (11 August), having been hit by a machine during a brief trip to Paris. At Christmas , Bram van Velde met Madeleine^{[clarification needed]} in Geneva, and the two became a couple.

Starting in , van Velde began to achieve a certain critical victory. Jean-Michel Meurice made a documentary film about the artist. Younger expressive painters such as Pierre Alechinsky and the Danish Cobra-painter Asger Jorn admired Van Velde's art and his privat vue on art very strongly; they met him frequently and permit their own art be influenced by his expressive art.

Van Velde shuttled between Paris and Geneva, and in he moved to the latter. When the relation with Madeleine broke down, he returned to the Bourgogne where he lived and worked in a very sober petite house. In Van Velde made his first lithography, and with the help of Jaques Putman he made long series of lithographies in the following years.

Bram van Velde | BorzoGallery: Bram van Velde (Dutch, –) is known for his lively, abstracted paintings, featuring expressive shapes and forms, drawing on the aesthetics of French Lyrical Abstraction. Van Velde was born in Holland, where his family was impoverished while he was a child, an experience that would affect him for the remain of his life.

In , and , van Velde had exhibitions in the United States organized by the Knoedler gallery. In the art critic^[who?] can appreciate him as 'an essential abstract expressionist painter with an independent vision'.

In he visited Willem de Kooning—also of Dutch origins—but the contact between the two artists is not very satisfying for either side. After , van Velde travelled to visit his own expositions in Poland, Iceland, Italy and Norway, Brussels, Copenhagen, Amsterdam and Rome.

He did not make much new work during this period. In , he was named "chevalier" of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, and the Netherlands awarded him the Order of Orange-Nassau in In , he painted at La Chapelle-sur-Carouge several large gouaches which are seen as the last "savage" appearance of colour in his work.

Abraham "Bram" Gerardus van Velde (19 October – 28 December ) was a Dutch painter known for an intensely colored and geometric semi-representational painting style related to Tachisme, and Lyrical Abstraction.

Aimé Maeght took him back in his gallery, almost 20 years after having dropped him. In , he was received by universities in Lausanne, Geneva and Neuchâtel, and in he was made chevalier of the "Order of the Falcon" in Iceland. For his 80th birthday, a collective homage was published by the presses at Fata Morgana (Montpellier).

Bram van Velde died on 28 December at Grimaud (near Arles), and is buried there. His mentor and friend Jacques Putman, who supported him and his career after Bram's departure from Maeght, is buried beside him (Putman died on 27 February in Paris).

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