Jean-Pierre Ransonnetl' lieux et liens (1972-1980)

A native of Lierneux in the Belgian Ardennes, Jean-Pierre Ransonnet (1944) dedicates his work to the memory of the places and relationships that surrounded him as a child. He is mainly known for his expressive, spontaneous and brightly-coloured oil paintings, showing forests, gardens, landscapes, some natural features and others that are more symbolic, even graphic, such as the letter “ l’ ”. Fifty years later, he uses anecdotes to look back and describe all the poetry of daily life, including both the most tender and the most tragic episodes.

However, a whole series of work produced between 1972 and 1980 represents a departure from this artwork. During these years, influenced by an avant-garde movement promoting the beginnings of artistic investigation, an almost total withdrawal from painting and sculpture, and even the abolition of the boundaries separating art and life, Jean-Pierre Ransonnet experimented with various new techniques. These works combine fan photography with drawing, text and painting, not without humour or a certain irony. If this represents a prelude to his better-known work – personal memories and autobiographical fragments about locations, links and Lierneux – these works were often considered as a time for research, a requisite step or tentative beginning.

Forty years later this work still appears fresh and relevant when compared to the return of materialism displayed by the new generation of plastic artists, and in opposition to the smooth, conformist images of the digital revolution at the start of the 21st century. Representative of the treatment of images during a time that saw the generalisation of mass media, the appearance of colour television, the democratisation of the camera and reproductive techniques for images, this little-known period of Jean-Pierre Ransonnet’s work is on show at the BPS22 from 18 February to 23 April 2023.

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Curator: Dorothée Duvivier
Exhibition: 18.02 > 23.04.2023
Opening 17.02.2023