Two names spring to mind when you look at the works by Jean Paul Riopelle ( Canada , 1923) and read about his life. He lived near Giverny ( the place where Monet had his studio and gardens) and he used a technique much the same as Jackson Pollock did. Dripping paint on a horizontal canvas. The result ….. colorful and abstract compositions which have the colors of a Monet painting and the abstract construction of a Pollock one.
Riopelle’s style in the 1940s changed quickly from Surrealism to Lyrical Abstraction (related to abstract expressionism), in which he used myriad tumultuous cubes and triangles of multicolored elements, facetted with a palette knife, spatula, or trowel, on often large canvases to create powerful atmospheres.
The presence of long filaments of paint in his painting from 1948 through the early 1950s has often been seen as resulting from a dripping technique like that of Jackson Pollock. Rather, the creation of such effects came from the act of throwing, with a palette knife or brush, large quantities of paint onto the stretched canvas (positioned vertically).
For me Riopelle is a fascinating artist and because of the beautiful publications Maeght made with this artist it is not entirely out of reach financially. A very nice Riopelle publications can be obtained for less than euro 100,– at www.ftn-books.com
