© André Ostier
"Painting is something that can only destroy itself, something that must destroy itself, so as to reinvent itself."
Jean Fautrier is one of the pioneers of informal art. His work is a representation of abstract forms in black light, achieved by way of a figuration which draws on still lifes, landscapes, and nudes of a raw realism. Especially from the 1940s onwards, Fautrier developed a technique of painting with glue which combined masses of pigment with transparent or opaque ink to achieve desired luminous harmonies, but also various anxiety-inducing impasto textures. His art strives toward a new type of image wherein matter assumes increasing importance in the representation of objects, landscapes or the body.