Karel Appel
Encyclopedia
Christiaan Karel Appel was a Dutch
painter
, sculptor
, and poet
. He started painting at the age of fourteen and studied at the Rijksakademie
in Amsterdam
in the 1940s. He was one of the founders of the avant-garde movement Cobra
in 1948.
, Netherlands
. On the ground floor, his father, Jan Appel, had a barber shop. His mother, born Johanna Chevalier, was a descendant of French Huguenot
s. Karel Appel had three brothers.
At fourteen, Appel produced his first real painting on canvas, a still life of a fruit basket. For his fifteenth birthday, his wealthy uncle Karel Chevalier gave him a paint set and an easel. An avid amateur painter himself, Chevalier gave his namesake some lessons in painting.
in Amsterdam during the German Occupation from 1940 to 1943 and met there the young painter Corneille
and, some years later, Constant
; they became close friends for years. His parents opposed his choice to become an artist, leading him to leave home; this was also necessary because he needed to hide from the German police so that he would not be picked up and sent to Germany to work in the weapon industry.
Appel had his first show in Groningen in 1946. In 1949 he participated with the other Cobra artists in the Stedelijk Museum
Amsterdam; this generated a huge scandal and many objections in the press and public. He was influenced by Pablo Picasso
, Henri Matisse
and the French brute-art artist Jean Dubuffet
. In 1947 he started sculpting with all kinds of used materials (in the technique of assemblage) and painted them in bright colors: white, red, yellow, blue and black.
He joined the Experimentele Groep in Holland together with the young Dutch painters Anton Rooskens, Theo Wolvecamp and Jan Nieuwenhuys
. Later the Belgian writer Hugo Claus
joined the group.
In 1948 Appel joined CoBrA
(from:Copenhagen, Bruxelles, Amsterdam) together with the Dutch artists Corneille
, Constant and Jan Nieuwenhuys (see also Aart Kemink
) and with the Belgian poet Christian Dotremont
. The new art of the Cobra-group was not popular in the Netherlands, but it found a warm and broad welcome in Denmark. By 1939, Danish artists had already started to make spontaneous art and one of their sources of inspiration was Danish and Nordic
mythology. It was also in Denmark that the Cobra artists started cooperating by collectively painting the insides of houses, which encouraged and intensified the exchange of the typical 'childish' and spontaneous picture language used by the CoBra group. Appel used this very intensively; his 1949 fresco 'Questioning Children' in Amsterdam City Hall caused controversy and was covered up for ten years.
As a result of this controversy and other negative Dutch reactions to Cobra Appel moved to Paris
in 1950 and he developed his international reputation travelling to Mexico
, the USA, Yugoslavia
and Brazil
. He is particularly noted for his mural work and lived in New York
and Florence
. After 1990 he became much more popular in the Netherlands; he had several big shows in Amsterdam and in Bruxelles, organized by director Rudy Fuchs. Also the Cobra-museum in Amstelveen organized several shows with his work. He became the most famous Dutch artist of Cobra.
Appel died on 3 May 2006 in his home in Zürich
, Switzerland
. He suffered from a heart ailment. He was buried on 16 May 2006 at the Père Lachaise Cemetery
in Paris
, France
.
Years before his death, Appel established the Karel Appel Foundation, whose purpose is "to preserve [Appel's] artworks, to promote public awareness and knowledge of Karel Appel's oeuvre and to supervise publication of the Oeuvre Catalogue of the paintings, the works on paper and the sculptures.".
In the wake of his death, the Foundation (based in Amsterdam
) functions as his official estate in addition to its primary service as an image archive. The U.S. copyright representative for the Karel Appel Foundation is the Artists Rights Society
Netherlands
The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...
painter
Painting
Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a surface . The application of the medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush but other objects can be used. In art, the term painting describes both the act and the result of the action. However, painting is...
, sculptor
Sculpture
Sculpture is three-dimensional artwork created by shaping or combining hard materials—typically stone such as marble—or metal, glass, or wood. Softer materials can also be used, such as clay, textiles, plastics, polymers and softer metals...
, and poet
Poet
A poet is a person who writes poetry. A poet's work can be literal, meaning that his work is derived from a specific event, or metaphorical, meaning that his work can take on many meanings and forms. Poets have existed since antiquity, in nearly all languages, and have produced works that vary...
. He started painting at the age of fourteen and studied at the Rijksakademie
Rijksakademie
The Rijksakademie van Beeldende Kunsten is a two-year residency for visual artists, based in Amsterdam, The Netherlands.Funded by the Dutch government, residents are granted a stipend and are allotted a personal studio in the former military barracks building in which the Rijksakademie is housed...
in Amsterdam
Amsterdam
Amsterdam is the largest city and the capital of the Netherlands. The current position of Amsterdam as capital city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands is governed by the constitution of August 24, 1815 and its successors. Amsterdam has a population of 783,364 within city limits, an urban population...
in the 1940s. He was one of the founders of the avant-garde movement Cobra
COBRA (avant-garde movement)
COBRA was a European avant-garde movement active from 1948 to 1951. The name was coined in 1948 by Christian Dotremont from the initials of the members' home cities: Copenhagen , Brussels , Amsterdam .-History:...
in 1948.
Childhood
Christiaan Karel Appel was born on 25 April 1921 in his parents' house at Dapperstraat 7 in AmsterdamAmsterdam
Amsterdam is the largest city and the capital of the Netherlands. The current position of Amsterdam as capital city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands is governed by the constitution of August 24, 1815 and its successors. Amsterdam has a population of 783,364 within city limits, an urban population...
, Netherlands
Netherlands
The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...
. On the ground floor, his father, Jan Appel, had a barber shop. His mother, born Johanna Chevalier, was a descendant of French Huguenot
Huguenot
The Huguenots were members of the Protestant Reformed Church of France during the 16th and 17th centuries. Since the 17th century, people who formerly would have been called Huguenots have instead simply been called French Protestants, a title suggested by their German co-religionists, the...
s. Karel Appel had three brothers.
At fourteen, Appel produced his first real painting on canvas, a still life of a fruit basket. For his fifteenth birthday, his wealthy uncle Karel Chevalier gave him a paint set and an easel. An avid amateur painter himself, Chevalier gave his namesake some lessons in painting.
Career
He studied at the Rijksakademie van Beeldende KunstenRijksakademie
The Rijksakademie van Beeldende Kunsten is a two-year residency for visual artists, based in Amsterdam, The Netherlands.Funded by the Dutch government, residents are granted a stipend and are allotted a personal studio in the former military barracks building in which the Rijksakademie is housed...
in Amsterdam during the German Occupation from 1940 to 1943 and met there the young painter Corneille
Guillaume Cornelis van Beverloo
Guillaume Cornelis van Beverloo , better known under his pseudonym Corneille, was a Dutch artist.Corneille was born in Liege, Belgium, although his parents were Dutch and moved back to the Netherlands when he was 12. He studied art at the Academy of Art in Amsterdam, in the Netherlands...
and, some years later, Constant
Constant Nieuwenhuys
Constant Anton Nieuwenhuys was a Dutch painter, and one of the foremost innovators of Unitary Urbanism. In 1941, he became deeply interested in the work of Paul Cézanne, Cubism and German Expressionism....
; they became close friends for years. His parents opposed his choice to become an artist, leading him to leave home; this was also necessary because he needed to hide from the German police so that he would not be picked up and sent to Germany to work in the weapon industry.
Appel had his first show in Groningen in 1946. In 1949 he participated with the other Cobra artists in the Stedelijk Museum
Stedelijk Museum
Founded in 1874, the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam is a museum for classic modern and contemporary art in Amsterdam in the Netherlands. It has been housed on the Paulus Potterstraat, next to Museum Square Museumplein and to the Rijksmuseum, Van Gogh Museum and the Concertgebouw, in Amsterdam Zuid...
Amsterdam; this generated a huge scandal and many objections in the press and public. He was influenced by Pablo Picasso
Pablo Picasso
Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y Picasso known as Pablo Ruiz Picasso was a Spanish expatriate painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist, and stage designer, one of the greatest and most influential artists of the...
, Henri Matisse
Henri Matisse
Henri Matisse was a French artist, known for his use of colour and his fluid and original draughtsmanship. He was a draughtsman, printmaker, and sculptor, but is known primarily as a painter...
and the French brute-art artist Jean Dubuffet
Jean Dubuffet
Jean Philippe Arthur Dubuffet was a French painter and sculptor. His idealistic approach to aesthetics embraced so called "low art" and eschewed traditional standards of beauty in favor of what he believed to be a more authentic and humanistic approach to image-making.-Life and work:Dubuffet was...
. In 1947 he started sculpting with all kinds of used materials (in the technique of assemblage) and painted them in bright colors: white, red, yellow, blue and black.
He joined the Experimentele Groep in Holland together with the young Dutch painters Anton Rooskens, Theo Wolvecamp and Jan Nieuwenhuys
Jan Nieuwenhuys
Jan Nieuwenhuys was a Dutch painter and one of the early active founders of the Dutch Experimentalists group that later became part of CoBrA.-Life and work:Nieuwenhuys was born in Amsterdam....
. Later the Belgian writer Hugo Claus
Hugo Claus
Hugo Maurice Julien Claus was a leading Belgian author who published under his own name as well as various pseudonyms. Claus' literary contributions spanned the genres of drama, the novel, and poetry; he also left a legacy as a painter and film director...
joined the group.
In 1948 Appel joined CoBrA
COBRA (avant-garde movement)
COBRA was a European avant-garde movement active from 1948 to 1951. The name was coined in 1948 by Christian Dotremont from the initials of the members' home cities: Copenhagen , Brussels , Amsterdam .-History:...
(from:Copenhagen, Bruxelles, Amsterdam) together with the Dutch artists Corneille
Guillaume Cornelis van Beverloo
Guillaume Cornelis van Beverloo , better known under his pseudonym Corneille, was a Dutch artist.Corneille was born in Liege, Belgium, although his parents were Dutch and moved back to the Netherlands when he was 12. He studied art at the Academy of Art in Amsterdam, in the Netherlands...
, Constant and Jan Nieuwenhuys (see also Aart Kemink
Aart Kemink
Aart Kemink was a Dutch-Canadian painter, born May 30, 1914 in Rotterdam, the Netherlands....
) and with the Belgian poet Christian Dotremont
Christian Dotremont
Christian Dotremont, , was a Belgian painter and poet who was born in Tervuren, Belgium. He was a founding member of the group Cobra, and later became well known for his painted poems, which he called logograms....
. The new art of the Cobra-group was not popular in the Netherlands, but it found a warm and broad welcome in Denmark. By 1939, Danish artists had already started to make spontaneous art and one of their sources of inspiration was Danish and Nordic
Nordic countries
The Nordic countries make up a region in Northern Europe and the North Atlantic which consists of Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden and their associated territories, the Faroe Islands, Greenland and Åland...
mythology. It was also in Denmark that the Cobra artists started cooperating by collectively painting the insides of houses, which encouraged and intensified the exchange of the typical 'childish' and spontaneous picture language used by the CoBra group. Appel used this very intensively; his 1949 fresco 'Questioning Children' in Amsterdam City Hall caused controversy and was covered up for ten years.
As a result of this controversy and other negative Dutch reactions to Cobra Appel moved to Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
in 1950 and he developed his international reputation travelling to Mexico
Mexico
The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
, the USA, Yugoslavia
Yugoslavia
Yugoslavia refers to three political entities that existed successively on the western part of the Balkans during most of the 20th century....
and Brazil
Brazil
Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...
. He is particularly noted for his mural work and lived in New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
and Florence
Florence
Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with approximately 370,000 inhabitants, expanding to over 1.5 million in the metropolitan area....
. After 1990 he became much more popular in the Netherlands; he had several big shows in Amsterdam and in Bruxelles, organized by director Rudy Fuchs. Also the Cobra-museum in Amstelveen organized several shows with his work. He became the most famous Dutch artist of Cobra.
Death
Zürich
Zurich is the largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zurich. It is located in central Switzerland at the northwestern tip of Lake Zurich...
, Switzerland
Switzerland
Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....
. He suffered from a heart ailment. He was buried on 16 May 2006 at the Père Lachaise Cemetery
Père Lachaise Cemetery
Père Lachaise Cemetery is the largest cemetery in the city of Paris, France , though there are larger cemeteries in the city's suburbs.Père Lachaise is in the 20th arrondissement, and is reputed to be the world's most-visited cemetery, attracting hundreds of thousands of visitors annually to the...
in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
.
Years before his death, Appel established the Karel Appel Foundation, whose purpose is "to preserve [Appel's] artworks, to promote public awareness and knowledge of Karel Appel's oeuvre and to supervise publication of the Oeuvre Catalogue of the paintings, the works on paper and the sculptures.".
In the wake of his death, the Foundation (based in Amsterdam
Amsterdam
Amsterdam is the largest city and the capital of the Netherlands. The current position of Amsterdam as capital city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands is governed by the constitution of August 24, 1815 and its successors. Amsterdam has a population of 783,364 within city limits, an urban population...
) functions as his official estate in addition to its primary service as an image archive. The U.S. copyright representative for the Karel Appel Foundation is the Artists Rights Society
Artists Rights Society
Artists Rights Society is a copyright, licensing, and monitoring organization for visual artists in the United States. Founded in 1987, ARS represents the intellectual property rights interests of over 50,000 visual artists and estates of visual artists from around the world .- Member Artists &...
External links
- Karel Appel Foundation
- Karel Appel, Dutch Expressionist Painter, Dies at 85 in the New York Times (obituary)
- Karel Appel in The GuardianThe GuardianThe Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
(obituary) - YouTube (Video of the Cobra Artist)
- Art Signature Dictionary - See Karel Appel's signature, although the police seizure of counterfeit