Yvon Adam (1932–2017) A Magnificent Album Containing 119 Envelopes Painted In Gouache—1954

Yvon Adam (1932–2017)119 envelopes painted in gouache, 1954–1955

Even before “Mail Art” had a name, a young painter from Liège, while in uniform, transformed every letter intended for his fiancée into a small work of art.

From February 1954 to April 1955, while serving in the military in Bourg-Léopold, Yvon Adam wrote to Mademoiselle Louise Denoël in Grivegnée.

He illustrated the envelopes with humor, tenderness, and a freedom that was already remarkable.

Some barely had an address. All arrived without delay.

This album, which has remained in the artist’s family without interruption, brings together the entire series: 119 envelopes painted in gouache, arranged in chronological order of their arrival around the 1990s, with the help of Adam himself.

The letters are gone. What remains are their painted casings.Over the course of fourteen months, they span nearly all the artistic styles the young painter was experimenting with at the time: Constructivist geometries, Fauvist flat colors, stylized fish, masks, smiling cats, jazz instruments, the sun, a heart held out to the mailman, a barracks room…

On one of them, King Baudouin’s head is detached from the stamp and superimposed onto a soldier’s body. Elsewhere, these words: “And here is the last one, Postman… Farewell, postman, and thank you again. ”

For fifty years, these envelopes hardly ever left the family. Only about fifty were displayed during the Yvon Adam retrospective at the Salle Saint-Georges in Liège in 2004.

The complete album, however, remained in the family.One hundred nineteen small paintings sent by mail. A rare, intact, tender, and masterful collection. The words have disappeared. The envelopes, however, are all still here.