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Artist Statement -



WORK OF ERIK PEVERNAGIE :

BRIDGING GAPS THROUGH ART

Art, by its creative power, unleashes positive energy, closer relations between individuals and peoples. Through art people meet and get to know each other. By its very nature, art is universal and makes it easier to cross frontiers and barriers. It helps to forget alienations.

Herald Tribune wrote quite rightly: " Bridging the gaps between generations, social strata and nationalities is a tricky business. However Erik Pevernagie may have hit upon a workable formula to ease the alienation. "

The paintings of Pevernagie can be situated in this frame.

The main theme in his work is man in his environment. The painter scans people and situations, juggles with colours and provokes emotions.
In the first place Erik Pevernagie wants to state his alliance with society and the world at large. He wants to give evidence of the elements which do strike him in daily life. In order to stress this evidence he uses slogans, outcries, certain " truths " in his paintings like graffiti.
His characters are expecting, looking forward, escaping, in quest of alternatives. Imagination is essential if we want to save our lives.

The artist wants to give evidence on many levels. Reality is not what it seems to be. Looking is important. But more important is " seeing " what is hidden behind the appearances.
With this statement of evidence the artist takes part in this operation of opening eyes and unlocking hearts.

" Idea and figuration mostly arise at the same moment", says Pevernagie. " Then follows the material substance and the colour process".
" Framing plays an important part. Where the objet is sectioned tension is created. Essential is creation of tension and some mental disorder".
" Of course a painting should have a value on its own. But the idea, the story, the background are additional values. The things which are'not- said' or 'not-painted' are as important as what is expressed or painted".


Artist Exhibitions



1979 LEUVEN :MUSEUM P.Van Humbeeck-M.Piron
1996 BRUSSELS: RIC'S ART BOAT
1997 ANTWERP: HOLIDAY INN CROWNE PLAZA
1997 PARIS: SAINT-GERMAIN DES PRES HOLIDAY INN
1997 BERLIN: SAS ALEXANDERPLATZ
1998 DUSSELDORF: SAS Karl-Arnold Platz
1998 LIEGE : ABBAYE DU VAL SAINT-LAMBERT -Salon des '30
1999 AMSTERDAM: SAS RUSLAND
1999 NAMUR: PALAIS DES EXPOSITIONS -Biennale Art en Wallonie
2002 BRUSSELS: RIC'S ART BOAT
2002 LUCCA(Italy):MUSEUM GILARDI ...

Artist Publications





* BENEZIT: DICTIONNAIRE DES PEINTRES(Paris,France)
"Man" stands in the heart of his work: man integrated in his natural environment, sometimes even absorbed by it. On the other hand he seems to deny it, as Pevernagie introduces graffiti in his paintings. So doing he gives evidence of the solitude of the human being, his alienation in the urban texture.
("L' homme" est au centre de son oeuvre, à la fois intégré dans son milieu naturel, on pourrait parfois dire absorbé par lui, et pourtant semblant le renier, d'autant plus fortement que Pevernagie introduit dans ses peintures des graffitis témoignant de la solitude de l'être humain au monde, de son aliénation dans le tissu urbain.")

* ARTO: DICTIONARY OF BELGIAN PAINTERS. (Belgium)
"Mixes figuration and abstraction with a poetic and philosophical key. Important are the framing, the intersections, the balance of the surfaces. Introduces extraneaous substances (ashes,sand,grit etc) which gives an aspect of strangeness and ruggedness as if he leaves traces of the past."



* BEELDEND BENELUX: Biographic dictionary (Tilburg,Netherlands)
His themes are:communication, isolation,human figure. His style is abstract with figurative elements.

* DICTIONARY OF BELGIAN PLASTIC ARTISTS: Paul Piron (Brussels,Belgium) Typical exponent of the contemporary artist who combines abstract and figurative elements in his work. He starts from an idea and expresses that idea in a plastic way. He depicts a world which has become confused and insecure. He asks questions which can be interpreted by the spectator.


* JEAN-PIERRE DELARGE(Paris,France)
Very early he has been attracted by "stylization", the rigidness in the figuration,"Why has She got Stars in the Sky?". Later the figuration has to be guessed,"Everybody his Story," some sharp angles already draw the shape of a man reading. Those shapes disappear more and more, "Mes cliques et mes Claques", and reaches the non-figuration thanks to the sharp angles which fill the whole canvass. There he suggests the flight of a bird, a flying plane, or pure geometrical compositions, defined by a thin black line.

* BERLINER KURIER (Berlin,Germany)
Truths stripped naked. Man in his environment is the central theme of Erik Pevernagie. He expresses himself with colors, signs,graffiti.

* ATTITUDE
A contemporary artist, a cosmopolitan man who keeps
his finger on the cultural puls in various cities in the world.

* Mathieu Ladeveze :
Communication or in-communication are recurring central themes in the painter's work.With a style that might look severe at first sight the artist expresses his art by means of sober colors, graffitis and most contemporary signs. Small details surrounding our daily life,like an electronic razor, the@ sign or an automobile take a totally different meaning and give particular dynamics to his whole work. They simply depict our fears and frustrations.

* Hermine Bokhorst :

To stretch reality in order to make an abstract universe with large geometric surfaces.A well structured art, a perception.For Pevernagie painting is a means for reflexion, evasion, a medicament.

° Stéphane Rey & Colette Berthot :

Always starting from an event of the collective memory Pevernagie paints a very insecure world in his very particular way.Half figurative, half abstract he mixes elements of earth, sand, metal cuttings on his canvas in sober beige, grey, velvet red tones.He starts with a simple graffiti, a sketch of a person or a detail from daily life. These are used as a pretext for a network of pure and well structured geometrical lines covering the whole surface of the canvas in order to bring about emotion.The titles are like twinklings in the eye.They are to be interpreted as one feels it. In the first degree or in the second degree.Astonishing in this work is the message that is brought to life. The artist asks questions.Life is seen by Pevernagie in different ways and painting is a way to express them. The paint brush is a means of evasion and the color a gate to reflexion.

°W. Toebosch :

The figures of Erik Pevernagie are absorbed, integrated in their environment by the color, the lines and by the" idea",which is most important in his work. He starts from an idea and then he paints it.With him we find the problems which keep him busy, which haunt us and which he depicts.He paints the alienation, the loneliness, the unrest, the uncertainty.Erik Pevernagie paints for a generation. Our world has been decomposed, fallen into pieces, become uncertain and unseizable. But art and poetry are ultimate recourses.Erik Pevernagie's work is a thrilling work. With him we enter a totally different universe than the recognizable and readable reality. It's a universe we can interpret.In his art questions are put. He has a vision on man and the world.This artist is captivating by his topics and by the way he is painting them.He brings about a change in our way of looking at the world.

* De Morgen:
He mainly expresses his belonging to this world in his work. He wants to testify.

* Le Soir:

Erik Pevernagie's canvas transmit messages which are very apparent. His works often start with a written sentence like a graffiti. Then comes the painting.

* Het Nieuwsblad:

Communication and particularly the impossibility to communicate are leitmotivs. A very elaborate color palette and shapes which tend towards abstraction give power to the message.

* L'événement:

Erik Pevernagie gives birth to abstract canvasses, forcefully covered with warm pigments and nervous graffiti before being slowly tamed until the shape emerges. His art is without doubt material and sensual but at the same time bears a real humanitarian message and brings about a new consciousness without compromise.

* Arts Antique Auctions:

Erik Pevernagie paints nudes and integrates them in the substance of his canvasses and his pigments, as if they where born from them, and adds messages to them. He expresses in his painting a very homogeneous and coherent sensual material substance. In his work not only the human body is shown but particularly the ideas which arise when looking at it.


* Le Vif L'Express:

Always listening to the world around him Erik Pevernagie grants to our fellow man a dominating place in his paintings. The individual is replaced in his environment,which is sometimes evoked by graffiti, and seems to be absorbed, dissolved by the elements surrounding him. The subtle touches of color, the half-abstract, half-figurative shapes, and the specific framing lead to the dissolution of the individual whose life seems to be but superficiality. Pevernagie invites us to go beyond the superficial barriers in order to discover the mystery behind his characters who are in perpetual tension as if they were waiting for something else, for another life.

* L'Echo:

His art is evolving around human being and his effort of conviviality. He introduces appeals, interpellations in his paintings by means of graffiti which slide into the color. He likes to bring about emotion and tension. The framing of his paintings often diverts us but so doing doesn't deteriorate the image.

* Het Laatste Nieuws:

The city, the loneliness and the alienation of its inhabitants is the main theme.



* La Dernière Heure :

The human being who is present in all his work is reduced to a congruent portion. Some pale traits, bodies blend into the canvas leaving space to accessories, highlighted by the artist in a more figurative manner. The material is omnipresent in Erik Pevernagie's paintings and give to his work all the intensity of the messages he tries to transmit. Metal, aluminium,sand. The rugedness of his canvasses is perfectly in tune with the long vanishing lines and the sharp angles of his paintings.



* Artistes & Galeries: Poncelet

"L'une des tendances majeures de la peinture actuelle- figurative en rupture de ban avec un abstractionnisme latent - consiste à enfouir le sujet dans un environnement singulier. Chez Erik Pevernagie, cette mise en condition de l'oeuvre est à la fois plastique et littéraire, le mot, le titre, la phrase, le graffiti prolongeant et éclairant à la fois l'effet visuel. Oeuvre pratiquement inclassable, tant semble culminer en elle divers courants."



* The Bulletin :

Pevernagie has exhibited worldwide. Using mixed media like metal filings, sand and oil paint, he has created some 15 "figuratively abstract" paintings on the theme of trust and communication with titles like "Could the Milkman be the Devil ?" and "Butchers an Pigs shouldn't make Friends"
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Artist Collections



Numerous private, corporate, museum, gallery and government collections detailed information coming soon.

Artist Favorites