Lyrical Abstraction: Judit REIGL and Henri MICHAUX

12 - 26 February 2025
Lyrical Abstraction: Judit REIGL and Henri MICHAUX

In France in the Post-War period, Lyrical Abstraction, led by Pierre Soulages, Hans Hartung and Gérard Schneider, becomes one of the most important artistic movements.
Its focus was on the individual gesture, its subjectivity, its poetry.
One of its main sources was the automatic drawing developped by the Surrealists, as well as Chinese and Japanese calligraphy. Their purpose was to capture the very subjective nature of the artistic gesture itself, far removed from the straight lines and flat colours of Geometric Abstraction. 
As such, both Judit Reigl, former member of the Surrealist group, and poet and artist Henri Michaux, proclaimed by Malraux "the first Occidental calligrapher", are exceptionally suited to tackle it. 
Here, we have the pleasure to persent two small formats that exemplify perfectly the spirit of lyrical abstraction.

  • Judit REIGL

    Judit REIGL: Déroulements

    Judit REIGL: Déroulements

    "That's what Déroulement is all about: taking action over time to find the fixed source that allows movement to exist." - Judit Reigl - Interview with Jean-Paul Ameline for Art in America magazine, April 2009.
    In her Déroulements, Judit Reigl captures something of the primal tempo and rythm of poetry and music.

    As Judit Reigl herself describes her artistic process: 

    ‘First phase - I spread a thin cotton ball (240 cm wide) from one corner of the studio, stapling only the top, over the blocks - of varying thickness and inclination - formed by my old paintings leaning against the wall. The whole length of the studio will be covered in this way, the different planes - advanced or recessed - and the void between the groups of scattered paintings. A section of wall too, and then the door - on the latter, the fabric hangs vertically. Here is an uninterrupted white path that flows, bypasses, changes direction at the corner of the studio, straddles obstacles, passes both in front of and behind me, finally stopping only for lack of space.

     

    Second phase - I turn on the radio, find some music, not as a stimulant or inspiration, but to broaden the limitation of my movements and gestures, by attuning them - physically - to an external requirement. I also set myself in motion, touching, punctuating and brushing the canvas with a brush dipped in glycerophtalic paint. I capture and emit snippets (neither form, nor writing, nor line) horizontally, from one undulating advance to the next. Starting at the top, from left to right, first stretching out, then filling the field, more and more curved. Never ceasing to modulate the frequency of the music to my body rhythm and/or my body rhythm to the frequency of the music. If the music stops, I stop; if it changes, I continue - discontinuously - until the inscription, completely decoded, invades all the available space (leaving voids only where the pictorial field has no support behind it, or where silence cuts it off, or the angle, the projections break it).’

    Translated with DeepL.com (free version)

  • Henri MICHAUX

    Henri Michaux: the last oil paintings

    Henri Michaux: the last oil paintings

    Near the end of his life, Henri Michaux, who had entreprised a long career in ink painting, does his very first oil on canvas paintings.His teacher in this art is none other than Pierre Soulages, his longtime friend.

     

     

    After an entire career in ink painting and calligraphy, which earns him the artistic reconnaissance of people such as Malraux, Henri Michaux decides to enterprise oil painting. He uses bright, luminous colours, and creates biomorphic forms in abstract landscapes. This work is one such example.