Background
Roger Raveel was born on July 15, 1921 in Machelen, Flemish Brabant Province, Belgium.
From 1942 to 1945 he continued this training at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Ghent.
Roger Raveel was born on July 15, 1921 in Machelen, Flemish Brabant Province, Belgium.
Raveel received his first academic training from Hubert Malfait in Deinze from 1933 to 1937 and, as a free student, from 1940 to 1941. From 1942 to 1945 he continued this training at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Ghent. Here too he got lessons from Hubert Malfait, who got to know him the technique of Frans Hals and Rubens. Raveel learned to put into perspective another teacher, Jos Verdegem, who spoke words of praise for his work. Raveel himself thought his first mentor was actually the Italian painter, sculptor and architect Giotto.
In the period 1955 - 1961 Raveel worked mainly abstract. Raveel taught from 1960 to 1973 at the academy of Deinze. From 1960 to 1962 he made study trips to Italy. In the 60s he became the pacesetter of the new figuration; Together with Raoul De Keyser, Etienne Elias, and the Dutchman Reinier Lucassen, he worked in 1966 on ceiling paintings in the castle in Beervelde, Belgium. The abstracting of Piet Mondrian and the expressionism of Vincent van Gogh were sources of inspiration for the style of painting that also became known as the 'new vision.'
The cellar fresco in the Castle in Beervelde, in 1966, with these friends, formed a first highlight of the 'new vision', in addition to the Dulcia project of Zottegem in 1969. At the Brussels North-South link he was commissioned in 1977 for a mural in the subway station Merode assigned and in 1989 he realized a spatial mural in the building of the Pilotage in Ostend. In the large art event "Beaufort 2003", along the entire Belgian coastline, he painted a complete tram set of De Lijn.
Raveels style is characterized by the mixture of abstract and figurative painting. In the image of a typical Flemish rural backyard with wax wire and concrete walls, for example, a completely white square appears (almost the hallmark of a Raveel). In fact, these white areas represent voids or absence. He gave motion by painting spots, because a moving object can not be displayed with a sharp image of it. Raveel sometimes integrated mirrors in his works, so that the environment could become part of his work. He did this, among other things, in "Karretje" to transport the sky, but also with two opposite mirrors in his "Beervelde" project. Motifs in bright, vital colors were sometimes delineated with dark contours.
In a number of works Raveel recorded real objects in the painting: wooden bed styles in "Memories of the deathbed of my mother" (1965), even a cage with a living pigeon in "Neerhof with a living pigeon" (1962). A few times Raveel also made three-dimensional objects, such as the cube-shaped trolley to transport the sky or white wooden swans for the canals in Bruges. Raveel not only worked as a painter, but also as a graphic artist. In 1984, for example, 33 prints of his "Genesis" were published, accompanied by the 33 appropriate poems by Hugo Claus. He also made numerous ceramics. In 1995 Raveel was elevated to the nobility as a knight.
As a result of the 85th birthday of the painter, there was a retrospective in the Venetian Galleries on the dyke in Ostend in early 2007, entitled "The painter speaks." In this exhibition, both the plastic and literary work of Raveel was illuminated. In addition to paintings, drawings, and graphics, objects, installations, and artists' books were exhibited. Raveel also designed the "Confrontatie" installation for the Koningspark in Ostend.
Since 1999 he has built his own museum in his hometown Machelen-aan-de-Leie, after a design by architect Stéphane Beel. It consists of an older building that has been restored and a new part. In the new part an important part of his own work has been accommodated. The arrangement is placed in chronological order and thus shows the development that the painter went through. In the old part there are changing exhibitions. In the spring of 2010 there was a tribute to Zulma, Raveel's deceased wife. There were paintings and drawings of the artist with the image of Zulma, his favorite model. After his death, the museum paid homage to the artist with the exhibition "Drawings and objects (and some paintings)."
Raveel died in early 2013 from the effects of pneumonia in the Sint-Vincentius hospital in Deinze. At the end of 2013, a monument was placed on the grave of the painter in the Cemetery of Machelen-aan-de-Leie after a design by architect Marc Felix.
Zulma
1948From my garden
1949Yellow man with Trolley
1952Man in yellow cap
1952Man with wire
1953Brooding farmer
1956Bull
1957Red earth
1960My garden
1962The window
1962Memory of my mother's deathbed
1965Illusionistic group
1967The cart to move the sky
1968Father in front of the windowpainting
1972Self-portrait with painting
1974Happy family
198210th may 1940, a moment without end
1988The lamb grieves patiently at his ultimate happiness in the slaughterhouse
1988The tomb of Pernath
1994Introspection
2002He felt that he had to look at everything again and look at things in a different light. Influence of data from physics and new technical developments gave him a different view of the world. He wanted to make that new world view visible in his art, which therefore received a very distinctive and specific design and content.
In 1948 Roger Raveel founded the group La Relève with Jan Burssens, Kamiel D'Havé, and Pierre Vlerick.
On May 17, 2009, the painter lost the 96-year-old Zulma, whom he called his muse. On February 3, 2011, Roger Raveel married Marleen De Muer, a primary school teacher in Lotenhulle.