1924 – 2024 is part of a series of exhibitions organized to mark the centenary of the birth of the artist. The gallery Petzel New York will celebrate the occasion with a solo show at TEFAF New York in May 2024, while Galerie Nathalie Obadia Paris will present a new personal exhibition at the Paris space later in June. These presentations precede the major retrospective devoted to Roger-Edgar Gillet at the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Rennes, due to open in 2026.
The present opus brings together a group of important paintings from the 1950s to the 1990s, with a particular focus on the large-scale scenes and landscapes of the 1980s. This selection reflects the diversity of Gillet’s work and career, from his ‘École de Paris’ abstraction period to the figurative years and his references to Daumier, Ensor, and Piranese.
About the artist:
1924 – 2004. Born in Paris, France. Lived and worked in Paris and Saint-Malo, France
From the beginning of the 1950s, defended by Michel Tapié, Gillet was part of the generation of post-war abstract painters, of the Paris school, before taking the path of expressionist figuration in the 1960s like Fautrier, Rebeyrolle and Dubuffet. Gillet was first exhibited in France by the historic galleries Claude Bernard, Rodolphe Stadler, Jeanne Bucher; then by the Ariel gallery run by Jean Pollak. He has also worked with Lorenzelli Arte, Italy; Nova Spectra, Amsterdam; Malborough, New York; as well as Stéphane Janssen, Fred Lanzenberg and Orion in Brussels. In Gillet’s painting we find many Belgian and northern European influences from Rembrandt to Ensor first, but also a great connivance with his friends Alechinsky and Reinhoud.
Gillet is present in many Belgian private and public collections, including the SMAK, Ghent; the Royal Museums of Fine Arts, Brussels; Fondation Roi Baudouin: Thomas Neirynck donation on deposit at BAM, Mons), as well as international collections: Center Pompidou, Museum of Modern Art of the City of Paris; the Museums of Fine Arts of Lyon, Rennes and Rouen; The Palais des Beaux-Arts in Lille; the Louisiana Museum of modern Art, Denmark; the Oslo Museum, Norway and the Museu de arte in São Paulo, Brazil, amongst others.
