Pieter Van Mol (painter, 1906)

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Pieter Van Mol (born August 3, 1906 in Malderen , Londerzeel , Belgium, † October 24, 1988 in Heidelberg , Germany) was a Belgian painter.

Life

The village doctor of Malderen discovered Pieter Van Mol's talent and introduced him to Romain Steppe, a marine painter from Antwerp . Steppe gave him the first lessons and recommended the boy to attend the art academy in Mechelen. In the academic year 24/25 he already got the third prize for painting in the class of Willem Rosier (Guillaume Rosier, 1850-1931). Accompanied by his teacher Gustave Van de Woestijne and four other classmates, Van Mol traveled to Italy in 1927 to study.

He then studied until 1931 at the Brussels Art Academy of Sint-Joost-ten-Node , sculpture with Gustave Fontaine and Etterbeek , painting with Albert Phillipot. Van Mol survived the difficult economic conditions in the 30s / 40s thanks to the support of his mentor Van de Woestijne and a fashion studio that he ran with his friend Medard Maertens (1875-1946), a Brabant Fauvist .

In the post-war period, Van Mol maintained contacts with painters from the so-called "Route Libre" and " La Jeune Peinture Belge ": Gaston Bertrand , Charles Leplae, Anne Bonnet , Jean Milo, Louis Van Lint , Jan Vaerter, Rik Slabbinck. From 1951 to 1956 he shared a studio in Brussels with Jan Cox (The Hague 1919 - Antwerp 1980).

After a short stay in Paris in 1959 as an employee at the Center International Royaumont, Van Mol went to the south of France to finally settle in Fontvieille, a village between Arles and Les Baux-de-Provence , at the foot of the Alpilles . The creative period of the "Peintre Belgo-Provencal", as it was called in the press, was extremely fruitful.

From 1962 to 1968 the artist regularly spent the winter months in London and other European cities in order to secure his livelihood with commissioned works - especially portraits. From 1960 to 1963 he participated annually in the "School of Seeing", the Oskar Kokoschkas art seminar in Salzburg . From the beginning of the 1970s, Van Mol visited Heidelberg regularly and finally settled there in 1979. During this time, he mainly created portraits and landscapes, including many Swiss motifs. From 1982 Van Mol had to give up painting because of an eye problem. He died on October 24, 1988 in Heidelberg.

plant

Van Mol's oeuvre includes oil paintings, watercolors and drawings with a wide range of motifs: landscapes, maritime scenes, portraits, figures, nudes, still lifes. An artistic focus is the landscapes from his time in southern France, which he depicts with rich, bright colors and fast, powerful brushstrokes without any frills. In his watercolors, Van Mol reduces the subject to the essentials, often to the limit of abstraction . He mastered the "art of omission".

Reception in Belgium

After Van Mol achieved regional fame in southern France and then met with a great response in southern Germany, the Belgians are now also discovering their "homeless son". As a member of the so-called "silent generation", it was not easy for him to stand out in Belgium alongside the overwhelming Flemish Expressionists and Abstracts. The numerous exhibitions in many different Belgian cities since his death reflect a growing interest in Pieter Van Mol's work.

Prizes and awards

  • 1969 First prize for portraits and honorary prize for all categories within the framework of the "Grand Prix International de Peinture de Provence et Côte d'Azur".
  • 1980 Willibald Kramm Prize in Heidelberg.

Public collections

Exhibitions (selection)

  • Arles (1961, 1962, 1963, 1964, 1967)
  • St Remy-de-Provence (1962, 1963)
  • St Raphael (1965, 1966)
  • Marseille (1966, 1967)
  • Aix-en-Provence (1961, 1962)
  • Heidelberg (1969, 1981, 1985, 1986, 1987)
  • Hamburg (1976)
  • Mainz (1979, 1980)
  • Mechelen (1977)
  • St. Amands a / d Schelde (1989, 1993, 1999)
  • St. Niklaas (1990)
  • Knokke (1991, 1998, 2004)
  • Londerzeel (2006)

literature

  • "Pieter Van Mol 1906–1988", René Turkry, ed. by maesfinepaintings
  • "Dictionnaire des Pleintres, Sculpteurs, Dessinateurs et Graveurs", E. Bénézit vol. 9. Paris 1999, p. 711
  • "De Belgische Beeldende Kunstenaars, uit de 19th en 20th eeuw", Paul Piron, Vol. 2. Brussels 1999, p. 1456
  • Dictionnaire Biographique Illustré des Artistes en Belgique depuis 1830 ", Arto Brussels 1995, p. 408, with ill. On p. 407, 489
  • Pieter Van Mol, exhibition at Stedelijk Museum Sint-Niklaas, 1990
  • Pieter Van Mol Huldeboek, 12 authors, published by "Kunstring Pieter Van Mol", Buggenhout 1990
personal data
SURNAME Van Mol, Pieter
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Belgian painter
DATE OF BIRTH August 3, 1906
PLACE OF BIRTH Malderen , Londerzeel , Belgium
DATE OF DEATH October 24, 1988
Place of death Heidelberg , Germany