Joostens, Paul

Gouache 40 x 55 cm at sight) - with frame 57.5 x 73 cm. Signed lower right. Painter, draftsman, engraver, he also produces collages, photomontages and objects. He writes poems, essays, reviews, an autobiography, dialogues, plays and a travel journal. Pursues studies at the Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp. He opts for a post-impressionist touch and assimilates the work of J. Ensor and the Fauve painters. Around 1916, he moved towards cubism and futurism. It is also the time of the first collages. From 1920, he produced Dadaist objects, assembled using a wide variety of materials. This aspect of his work allows him to be designated as an avant-garde artist. In 1927, he renounced modernism and was inspired by the Bruges of the Middle Ages. From 1930 to 1935, he went through a mystical-religious period in a cubist-expressionist style. After 1935, he experienced a more intimate, less tormented period, he devoted himself to photographic montages. On the threshold of the Second World War, his work becomes more irrational, symbolic, visionary. He paints "Poezeloezen", half Virgins, half cinema actresses. The woman becomes the main theme of his research. At the same time, he returned to Dadaist assemblages. Works at the Royal Museum of Fine Arts in Antwerp (Antwerp), Belgian State (Brussels), Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium (Brussels), Provinciaal Museum voor Moderne Kunst (Ostende)