J’ai cédé à divers mouvements et maintenant encore je cherche, mais je ne sais plus quoi, on croit un beau jour avoir trouvé l’idée ou l’homme, et puis c’est un système bien présenté que tu as démoli en l’approchant..“ Engel-Pak, Pionnier de l’abstraction

Galerie Intuiti Paris and Galerie Intuiti Brussels present: Engel-Pak.

Engel-Pak, a painter, draftsman and illustrator, was born in the late 19th century in Spa (Belgium).

In his early fourties, he decides to focus on painting and moves to Paris.

Influenced by the ideas of the Avant-Garde, his artistic practice becomes more abstract.

Not admitted at « Le salon d’automne » in 1927, he exhibited abstract paintings at « le salon des refusés ». His relationship with actors of the DADA and surrealism movements leads him to develop a lyrical and abstract art as from 1929.

During this period, he exhibited with representatives of the main artistic trends of the Avant-Garde such as Arp, Delaunay, Gleizes, Herbin, Kupka, Mondrian, Van Doesburg.

In 1934, he settles in the south of France until the end of the war when he returns to Paris. On this occasion he meets and becomes friend of Paul Eluard for whom he illustrated «Objects of words and images ». Exhibited at the « Salon Réalités Nouvelles » , his work is then presented in numerous galleries in the south of France, in Paris and in Brussels.

Engel-Pak - Painting Research

Engel Pak belongs to the Abstract Expressionists: his painting is gestural and uncompromising.

His work, which can only be understood over time, focuses on process and perception.

Not surprisingly for an autodidact, Engel Pack’s way of painting and his work are characterized by a search that is itself dictated by an «inner need», existential and instinctual. The artist spent years creating abstract paintings of an incredible sensorial richness, working on forms and with colors, observing relentlessly his own paintings and those of other artists, merely noting their subjective and pathetic effect on his artistic and poetic soul of great sensitivity to color.

Engel-Pak was a man of his time, fed by the most contemporary pictorial research but who never accepted to abide by the formal rules of the thenprevailing art movements. Careful spectator of his environment, he embraced the various quests of this period but never forgot his own personal [project / journey / development / trajectory].

From 1929, his companionship with many ex-dada and surrealist artists offers him the opportunity to explore a dream world that was until then out of reach of his figurative painting. From cubism, he retains the ability to produce signs carrying their own expressive values.

A self-effacing character, Ernest Engel Pack was not seeking recognition or honours and felt uncomfortable with the intricacies of the Parisian art community. He decided to leave the capital in 1952 and to relocate to the south of France to find working conditions best suited to the pursuit of his artistic approach where he could fully focus on his research of balance between pictorial matter and light.

Engel-Pak, who felt free from commitment to any plastic norm created a lyrical work, rich and original. Bridge between the surrealist abstraction and lyrical abstraction, he can legitimately claim to be a decisive actor in the history of 20th century art.

Exhibition at Galerie Intuiti Paris: 23 May - 20 June 2015.
Exhibition at Galerie Intuiti Brussels: 21 May - 13 June 2015.