Original Ink Wash on paper By Joseph Lacasse Signed and dated 1960
Original Ink Wash on paper By Joseph Lacasse Signed and dated 1960
Belgian-French Abstract artist Joseph Lacasse is one of the most individual abstract painters of the École de Paris (School of Paris). Born into a poor working-class family in the quarry town of Tournai, Belgium. Lacasse's experience working as a child labourer (1905-1910) shaped his career as an artist. The young Lacasse would take home small off-cuts from the quarry slabs and depict them in chalk on black paper. He drew impressions of the stone as it appeared whilst the light of the sun was refracted into a prism. Lacasse drew the stones from close-up, using his chalks to recreate the light glowing from within. Light and colour would remain central to his unique artistic style.
Lacasse would eventually settle in Paris, acquiring a studio in Montparnasse in 1928, and moving amongst some of the most well-known artists of the early 20th century, including Constantin Brancusi, Sonia Delaunay, Marcel Duchamp, Jean Arp, Barbara Hepworth and Ben Nicholson. During the 1950s, Max Ernst, Jean Tinguely and Niki de Saint-Phalle would also set up studios and work there. Arguably, Lacasse’s most important and enduring friendship was with Robert and Sonia Delaunay whom he met in 1927-28. Their relationship would prove key to Lacasse’s artistic development, Robert’s influence on his colour palette being profound.
By 1938 Serge Poliakoff had made frequent visits to Lacasse’s studio, where he would see Lacasse’s abstract compositions, learning much from his contemporary. During the war years, Lacasse left for England, and on his return to Paris in 1946, he was dismayed to find that in his absence he had been relegated to the status of follower, rather than precursor, of Poliakoff. In response, Lacasse would produce his ‘Balancement’ series. Highly advanced in composition and richly textured, these sophisticated and poetic paintings are a testament to Lacasse’s superior understanding and analysis of Abstraction.
Lacasse was a pioneer in many ways, leaving behind a complex and challenging body of work. Throughout his entire career, from Figuration to Abstraction, light remained the central axis around which his work turned.
The works of Lacasse are in museums worldwide including: Musée d'art moderne de la Ville de Paris; Musée national d'art Moderne, Centre Pompidou, Paris; Musée des Arts Décoratifs, Paris; Musée des Beaux-Arts, Brussels; Musée de la Boverie, Liege; Magritte Museum Jette, Jette; Musée de Tournai, Tournai; Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Tel Aviv; Eilat Museum, Eilat; Carnegie Institute, Pittsburgh; National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne; Museum of Modern Art, New York
H 98cm, W 78cm
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