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Bram van de
Vel

Netherlands • born in XX century

Bram van Velde (niderl. Bram (Abraham Gerardus) van Velde, 19 Oct 1895, Zoeterwoude, Netherlands – December 28, 1981, in Grimaud, France), was a Dutch painter.

The son of a small businessman who abandoned his family. Mother with four children in deep poverty lived in Leiden, the Hague, etc. In 1907, Bram van Velde arrived in the Hague apprentice in a design firm, received some support from local sponsors, and copied in the Museum of the old Dutch masters. From 1922 he travelled in Europe, nepodalku lived in Munich, Bremen, in the German colony of artists in Worpswede (which once was close and wrote about R. M. Rilke), then in Paris, again in Bremen (where in 1927 he held his first exhibition), then in Berlin and Paris. In the French capital in the late 1920s - early 1930s – along with his brother Ger van Velde (1897-1987) is several times exhibited in the Salon of independents. During this period I discovered the paintings of Matisse met Picasso. From 1929 to 1936, together with his wife, German artist Lilli Klecker, lived in Spain, the family was destitute. His wife died in the hospital, B. van V. was repatriated to France. He was arrested several times by the French authorities because of irregularities in the documents, and conversations on the streets in German, etc. became Friends with S. Beckett, who wrote several times about his work.

Despite the fact that at the end of the 1930s the artist seemed to have found their real style, becoming one of the leaders of informale in 1941 he abandons painting and begins to write only in 1945 (such gaps and dashes have happened in the works of B. V. van more than once). The first large exhibition of his works at a gallery in Paris took place in 1946 and was absolutely disastrous. The same was exhibition in 1947 at the gallery aimé Mage in 1948 in new York. The artist again throws the painting, a Magician in 1952 breaks a contract with him. In 1958 a major retrospective of van B. V. arranges the Kunsthalle in Bern, and the artist moved to Geneva. For several years he divides life between Geneva and Paris, and from 1967, almost always lives in Switzerland.

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