18 october 2021, Manuela Klerkx
Jacques Charlier: ‘‘Don’t take art au serieux”
Recently, Sofie Van den Bussche opened her new gallery in Brussels’ bustling Dansaert district with the solo exhibition ‘Hybride Schilderijen. Binaire handelingen, met vlieg, trans-kubistische beelden, en andere…’ by the Belgian artist Jacques Charlier (1939). The two have known each other since Van den Bussche's childhood because her father Willy Van den Bussche (1942-2013) - a prominent curator and museum director and one of the champions of museums for modern and contemporary art in Flanders - and Jacques Charlier were friends. The talent of this Liège-born painter and conceptual artist is hard to explain in a few words, but that is precisely why his work is so colourful and unique.
An introduction.
His first exhibitions, in the early 1960s, consisted of Neo-Dadaist mises en scene of collected objects and photographs. With the advent of Pop Art and Nouveau Réalisme vogue in 1963, Charlier started to question the hypes and commerce that increasingly held the art world in its sway. He developed his own critical visual language in response to the prevailing avant-garde, which was full of contradictions and pretensions.
In contrast to the what-you-see-is-what-you-get mentality, which - with the rise of Pop Art - became omnipresent in the art world and the media, Charlier posited the importance or quality of a work of art not only in - but also behind the image, namely in the ideas and protests against the so-called intellectual avantgarde in art, which he always tried to subtly undermine.
Jacques Charlier, Curvilinear painting with fly, 2019, Gallery Sofie Van den Bussche.
His ironic way of working, his critical and realistic view
on the art system, his youthfulness (despite his age!),
his vitality, his energy, his incredible productivity,
his eclecticism, his mixture of genres,
his historical value to Belgian art…*
Until 1969, Charlier was mainly involved in musical and video experiments, performances with conferences on art, poetic texts and comics. He also published a magazine, made radio and even founded an art rehab centre. These were the years in which his work was often shown at the same galleries as that of his friend Marcel Broodthaers, they shared a strong sense of anarchism, poetry and humour.
From the early 1980s, in the heyday of Post-Modernism, Charlier returned to painting but also continued to be active as a multidisciplinary artist. By the 1990s, the parodying of art history had become his signature style. Although it cannot be defined, Charlier remained true to himself.
Jacques Charlier, After, 2020, Gallery Sofie Van den Bussche.
All artists are looking for their style; mine consists of making all my dreams come true.
I am constantly changing. I try all means of expression and keep my freedom.
That is paradoxical. It's like a role play: for every idea I write a scenario, for which players and a set is needed…
The technique comes according to the idea,
for the effect it will produce.*
As a true independent learner, Charlier made art history his own by reading endlessly and visiting countless studios and galleries. In this way he nurtured his critical and independent spirit and soon came to the conclusion that he didn't want to belong anywhere. One can notice that in the way in which he does not put art on a pedestal, but rather puts it into perspective.
All his life, Charlier has refused to take art seriously. Humour and irony are a common thread in his eclectic oeuvre, which testifies to a great imagination. For example, take the little black fly that adorns or disrupts his abstract and Suprematist paintings. The viewer is initially attracted to the atmosphere and the quality of the painting, but as soon as he observes the fly, this attraction diminishes. By making the contrast between life and art visible in this way, Charlier puts art into perspective and celebrates life: in his eyes the highest art form.
Jacques Charlier, At, 2021, Gallery Sofie Van den Bussche.
The finissage of the exhibition will take place on Sunday 24 October from 2:00pm to 6:00pm. The artist will be present. .
* Marie Godfroid, www.wawmagazine.be/nl/jacques-charlier-de-vraatzuchtige-kunstenaar-met-een-brede-creatieve-belangstelling
