Jean-michel folon biography
Jean-Michel Folon
Belgian artist (1934–2005)
Jean-Michel Folon (1 March 1934 – 20 October 2005) was a Belgian artist, illustrator, painter, and sculptor.
Early life
Folon was born on 1 March 1934 in Uccle, Brussels, in 1934. He studied architecture at the Institut Saint-Luc.
Career
The first exhibition of his watercolors was in New York in 1969 in the Lefebre Gallery. One year later he exhibited in Tokyo and in the Il Milione gallery in Milan. He also participated in the XXVth Venice Biennale. In 1973 he joined the selection of Belgian artists in the XXVth São Paulo Biennale, where he was granted the Grand Prize in Painting. Over the years his work concentrated on different techniques, including watercolor, etching, silkscreen, illustrations, mosaics, and stained glass, which showed the diversity of his art. His work Ein Baum stirbt - Un albero muore, 1974, is by Museo Cantonale d’Arte [de] of Lugano. He also designed numerous posters, often for humanitarian causes. Around 1988 he created his first sculptures made out of wood. He then moved on to creating sculptures in clay, plaster, bronze and marble, while continuing to paint.
Several museums dedicated exhibitions to him, among them the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris in 1971, the Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen in Rotterdam in 1976, the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London in 1977, the Musée Picasso in Antibes in 1984, the Museo Correr in Venice in 1986, the Museo de Bellas Artes in Buenos Aires in 1987, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York in 1990, La Pedrera in Barcelona in 1993, the Bunkamura in Tokyo in 1995, the Olympic Museum in Lausanne in 1996 and the Museo Morandi [it] in Bologna in 1996–97. In 1999 an exhibition of large sculptures was presented in the Galerie Guy Pieters, in Saint-Paul de Vence. In 2000 he opened the Fondation Folon, which presents the essentials of his work in the region he grew up in. In 2001 the city of Lis Jean-Michel Folon was born in Brussels on 1 March 1934 and grew up in Belgium. At the age of 20, he began a course in industrial design at the La Cambre School of Art and then, in 1955, moved to Bougival, on the outskirts of Paris, where he lived for a number of years in a gardener’s lodge. The French press was slow to recognise his talents, but the big American magazines, including Horizon, Esquire, The New Yorker, Fortune and Time, gave him the opportunity to create front covers and many stunning prints. This was his first step on the road to success. Soon, galleries and museums the world over were welcoming him with open arms – New York, Chicago, Milan, Venice, São Paulo, Buenos Aires, Barcelona, Tokyo, etc. Drawings, paintings, sculptures… his art expanded in many directions. He illustrated works by leading writers such as Kafka, H. G. Wells, Prévert, Vian, Borges and Bradbury. He created monumental murals, stained glass, tapestries, theatre and opera sets, and sculptures. An expert in the art of communication, he designed more than 500 posters. In 1972, Michel Polac gave Folon an acting role in his film La Chute d’un corps. Folon went on to act in a number of films alongside Rufus, Michel Piccoli, Patrick Dewaere, Marthe Keller, Miou-Miou and Marlène Jobert. In 2000, he opened the Fondation Folon in the Solvay Estate in La Hulpe. Visitors can now view most of his work in a place and setting that held such happy childhood memories for him. He died on 20 October 2005, at the age of 71. Read Jean-Michel Folon’s full biography In 1960, Folon decided to send some drawings, like a kind of message in a bottle, to New York magazines, some of which were quick to show enthusiasm for his work. They were published in Horizon, Esquire and The New Yorker, and then in Fortune, Atlantic Monthly and Time. In the early 1960s, Folon travelled to New York and met Saul Steinberg, who had a major influence on his work at that time and urged him to study the work of Paul Klee. Folon’s success in the United States opened the doors to galleries and magazines in Europe. Along with Roland Topor, Folon made his mark as one of the great graphic artists of his time: “My drawings may look like comics, but they are not designed to make people laugh.” It was during this period that he designed his first posters. A master communicator, he went on to create more than six hundred over the course of his career. Following frequent visits to Italy, he met the author Giorgio Soavi, who was the artistic director at Olivetti. From 1965 onwards, Folon delivered a large number of design projects for the Italian company: posters, illustrations for texts, cartoons (Le message), calendar, etc. In 1968, he produced a 36 mmural for the French pavilion at the Milan Triennale. In 1969, he exhibited his work for the first time in New York, at the Lefebre Gallery. Colette and Jean-Michel had two children: François, who was born in 1963, and Catherine, who was born in 1967 but died at the age of 4. In 1968, the Folons left their home in Paris and moved to Burcy, in the Beauce region of France, where they set up home in an old farm with ‘stunning views’. This played a defining role in Folon’s work and prompted him to take up wa Folon Biography Jean-Michel Folon was born in Brussels in 1934. He grew up in a modest bourgeois family where his father was a wholesale paper dealer. Young Jean-Michel loved to draw and showed a strong desire to be an artist. His father however thought being an artist was impractical and enrolled his son in the architecture program at Ecole Saint-Luc in Brussels. According to Folon, he "spent the next four years drawing bricks" and left the school just six months before he was to receive his diploma. In 1955, he hitchhiked to Paris with nothing but a small blue bag and his drawing materials. He lived with a friend's aunt just outside Paris and spent the next four years drawing. He began using pen and ink but soon transitioned to watercolor because of the lovely effect of light and transparency that could be produced in that medium. Folon is best known for his imaginary landscapes and cityscapes peopled with little hatted men, robots or a wind up toy. Innocent, dreamlike and whimsical his work aims to speak to the child that lingers in every adult. Folon's universal appeal is perhaps due to the nuanced temperature of his colors and the comical characters that ponder man's predicament, depicting human feelings such as love, loss, loneliness, joy, and hope. Folon's work has appeared on the cover of several internationally renown magazines such as Time, The New Yorker, L'Express, Graphis and Le Nouvel Observateur. He has illustrated literary works by Lewis Carroll, Jorge Luis Borges, Ray Bradbury, and Franz Kafka. His watercolors, graphic works, and drawings have been exhibited through out the world including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, London's Institute of Contemporary Arts and innumerous galleries in France, Italy and Japan. Folon has designed sets for major opera and theater productions. In addition he has created his own films and animated shows for French television. Folon iconic images have been used as posters for comme