Michel Henry [Transparent Veil] Oil painting No. 5 [Framed]

2003 work

This is a painting commissioned by the artist Michel Henry for our company (Galerie Adeka). 

Michel Henry is a painter who mainly paints flowers, and together with Buffet and Brasilier, he is one of the leading painters in the 20th century French art world. His paintings give off a sense of happiness, so he is called the painter of happiness in France, and the king of poppies in America, because he paints many poppies. His transparent colors are likened to jewels. Red is said to be the color of ruby, blue is the color of sawaire, green is the color of emerald, and deep brown is the color of topaz. Michel Henry's paintings are collected by the Museum of Modern Art in Paris, the Swedish royal family, the Principality of Monaco, the Saudi Arabian royal family, and others. Galerie Adeka has been the sole distributor of Michel Henry in Japan since 1995, planning Michel Henry exhibitions in famous department stores and galleries throughout Japan, producing original prints signed by the artist himself, selling painting prints, and managing copyrights.

Work Description

A red bouquet in a floral vase is seen through a translucent white veil. The long, narrow stand under the vase is also painted translucent white like the veil, but the pink of the background can be seen through. Michel Henry painted several paintings with this composition in the early 2000s. In most of his paintings, he used large canvases, between 30 and 50 cm, and the bouquet is of hydrangeas. In this painting, it is difficult to tell what kind of flower it is. The leaves look like roses, and they also seem to be slightly smaller versions of hydrangea leaves. The flowers are orange and red, so they are not hydrangeas. Considering 100% red as the base, pink is closer to blue, and from pink through purple to blue. If the proportion of red is reduced, orange becomes closer to yellow. There is a print (serigraph) called "Hydrangea Veil," in which the hydrangeas are painted in pink, and the mysterious atmosphere of the veil harmonizes with the fantastical atmosphere of the hydrangeas. However, this oil painting (size 5) has a bright orange red in the center, and rather than a mysterious atmosphere, the shining bouquet is the focus, and the veil and pink background play a supporting role. The vase is not the crystal vase that Michel Henry usually uses to arrange flowers, but a ceramic vase painted with flowers of the same color family as the bouquet, so the red flowers in the vase are integrated with the red of the bouquet. The bright white of the vase has a shine as if it is lit, unlike the translucent white of the veil, and helps to guide the eye to the bouquet.

Gallery Adeka Yasuhiro Takeda