Intense and diverse

This Sunday sees the opening of an exciting new exhibition in the Cultural Centre (Cultuurcentrum) of Hasselt in Belgium. Entitled Helikon: intens en divers, it celebrates the work of the pioneering Helikon gallery, which brought contemporary and avant-garde art to Hasselt through the 1960s. It will run until Sunday 10 January 2010.

The main members of the Helikon group were Pierre Cox, Paule Nolens, Lucienne Porta, Ray Remans, Amand van Rompay, Robert Vandereycken, and Walter Vilain. Although I have recently acquired work by many Belgian artists of the 1970s, in a nearly complete run of the graphics portfolios De Bladen voor de Grafiek, unfortunately I don’t have any work to show by any of the Helikon artists. However, courtesy of Jo Klaps, the designer of the exhibition, I can offer a link here to photos of the exhibition in preparation.

The curator of the exhibition, who has also written the catalogue, is my friend, the art historian Zsuzsanna Böröcz. It has been my great pleasure to be able to lend a number of graphic works to the exhibition by various European artists whose art was exhibited by Helikon. For all those who will not be able to make to see the show in situ (sadly, including myself), here is a mini-exhibition of the works currently on loan from Idbury Prints to Helikon: intens en divers. And for the information of any curators reading this blog, I am always happy to lend work for exhibition if I can.

René Bazaine, Composition

Pochoir, 1958

Georges Braque, Figure

Lithograph, 1938

Georges Braque, La bouteille de marc

Pochoir, 1956

Georges Braque, Oiseau

Lithograph, 1958

Yves Brayer, Venise la Rouge XV

Lithograph, 1939

Yves Brayer, Venise la Rouge XVI

Lithograph, 1939

Jean Dubuffet, Personnage II

Pochoir, 1955

Raoul Dufy, Man reading in a deckchair

Lithograph, 1920

Max Ernst, Un chant d’amour

Lithograph, 1958

Oskar Kokoschka, Mädchenbildnis

Lithograph, 1920

Fernand Léger, La chapellerie

Lithograph, published posthumously in 1960

Fernand Léger, La femme à la fleur

Lithograph, published posthumously in 1960

Alfred Manessier, Croquis

Lithograph, 1962

Henri Matisse, La danse

Lithograph, 1938

Henri Matisse, Zulma

Lithograph, 1950

Joan Miró, Composition pour Jacques Prévert I

Lithograph, 1956

Joan Miró, Composition pour Jacques Prévert III

Lithograph, 1956

Pablo Picasso, Les deux frères

Pochoir after the painting by Picasso, 1930

Pablo Picasso, Hélène chez Archimède

Wood engraving by Georges Aubert after Picasso, 1931

Pablo Picasso, Deux femmes près de la fenêtre

Reduced facsimile linocut, 1959

Georges Rouault, Tête de jeune fille

Lithograph, 1939

Victor Vasarely, Témoignage XXVII

Pochoir, 1952