Leon Engelen
THE ARTIST:
Leon Engelen was born in 1943 in Bree (Belgium). He grew up in the middle of an at that time virgin nature, in which there were a lot of beautiful little farms. Although he was creative, he didn't excel in painting. But unconsciously he absorbed his environment. Gradually he got a vision and became more mature, so that nowadays he can revive the survivals of his youth in his paintings.

According to Leon, there should be two in the art of painting, the painter and the spectator. The painter creates something the spectator may complete. When this interaction is accomplished, the painter's intention has succeeded. In traditional painting the interaction is on the level of the image. The spectator should see an image in which he believes, that conjures him a whole world. In abstract painting the interaction is fundamentally different, because not the image itself but the ideas are emphasized. The spectator isn't confronted with an image but with an idea. When you work in an abstract way, you reach people who think in an abstract way. Interaction is very important; without interaction there is no art, but just an artist.

Leon has attended the painting academy for several years. In 1968 he left it, because he didn't agree with the trends in it. He was no longer allowed to paint, but has to work with paintrollers and to splash with paint. In 1974 he started painting on chalk canvas; that's linen he prepares himself, which gives him other possibilities. The paint soaks into the priming-coat and can be painted over immediately. This technique, as old as the art of painting itself, has dropped out of use during the last 100 years.

Leon's starting-point is reality. A subject catches his interest, he starts painting it and during that process things are added to it; what he sees is what he wants to see. Everything Leon looks at is automatically reduced to a painting subject. He can no longer look at something in a normal way. In front of him he sees immediately the drawing, the structure and the colours he'll need. He looks at everything as a painting subject. He simply can't look at them in another way, not even at things he isn't interested in for painting.

Leon's work is linked to that of landscape and animal painter of the previous centuries. In former times there was a painters' community, in which strong mutual ties existed and in which techniques and ideas were exchanged. Leon can't take advantage of such a feed-back; he had to find it all by himself, which makes him more or less apart. Moreover he specialized himself in painting bricks and tiles.

According to Leon, the art of painting will follow its own path; he thinks it's nonsense to push it in a certain direction. It will be the side-slips, who become determining. But Leon doesn't know if he can count himself to that category. He paints what he thinks he ought to paint, in a certain manner, as good as he can do it. One has to accept it or not, whether you think it's beautiful or not.


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