Lithograph

Lithograph "L'Azalée bleue" by Paul Delvaux, dating from 1969

Color lithograph printed on Arches vellum, Signed lower right and numbered lower left 67/75 in pencil, mounted in a gilded wooden frame. Paul Delvaux (1897 - 1994) is a Belgian post-impressionist, expressionist and surrealist painter. He studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Brussels, studying architecture and then painting with the sculptor, painter and muralist Constant Montald. In 1934, he discovered a painting by Giorgio De Chirico entitled “Melancholy and mystery of a street”, a real revelation for the artist who then turned towards surrealism. Without ever joining the movement, he begins, with "Women in Lace", a series of works of such profound unity that any of his paintings can be recognized at first glance. It is classified rather in magical realism, with a universe close to artists like Carel Willink or Bathus. In 1936, he organized an exhibition at the Palais des Beaux-Arts in Brussels with René Magritte, member of the Belgian group "Les Compagnons de l'Art", then two solo exhibitions in 1938, at the Palais des Beaux-Arts in Brussels and in London. The same year, he participated in the International Exhibition of Surrealism at the Galerie des Beaux-Arts in Paris, organized by André Breton and Paul Eluard. He is known for his representations of naked women, between hypnotized gazes and mysterious gestures, in unusual places, such as train stations or classic buildings, sometimes accompanied by skeletons, men in bowler hats or scientists straight out of a history of Jules Verne. Today, his works are in prestigious collections around the world, including the Art Institute of Chicago, the Guggenheim in Venice, the Met in New York, the Fukuoka Art Museum in Japan, the museum and the Paul Delvaux Foundation in Belgium.

The work is visible at the Courcelles Antiquités Gallery, at 41 rue des Acacias, in the 17th arrondissement of Paris.