Biography
A painter, engraver and artist, Pierre Alechinsky has lived and worked in France since 1951. Between 1944 and 1948, he studied typography and book illustration at the École nationale supérieure d’Architecture et des Arts décoratifs (La Cambre, Brussels). Around the same time, he started painting, and joined the Young Belgian Painters group (Jeune Peinture Belge). In 1949, after meeting the poet Christian Dotremont, he joined the CoBrA (Copenhagen/Brussels/Amsterdam) group.
In 1951, the year the CoBrA movement was dissolved, Alechinsky organized the second and final CoBrA International Exhibition of Experimental Art at the Palais des Beaux-Arts in Liège. Thereafter he left Brussels for Paris. From 1962 onwards, he was represented by Galerie de France. In 1965, André Breton chose his work “Central Park” (1965) for the 11th International Surrealism Exhibition in Paris. This work was a turning point in Alechinsky’s career. Since 1979, Pierre Alechinsky has been represented by Galerie Lelong.
Over the years, many institutions have hosted retrospectives of Alechinsky’s work: Carnegie Institute, Pittsburgh (1977); MoMA, New York (1981); Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York (1986); Galerie nationale du Jeu de Paume, Paris (1998); IVAM, Valencia (2000); Centre de la gravure et de l’image imprimée, La Louvière (2000); Cabinet d’art graphique du Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris (2004); BNF, Paris (2005); Musée Granet, Aix en Provence (2010); Círculo de Bellas Artes, Madrid (2015); the museums of Osaka and Tokyo (2016-2017).
Pierre Alechinsky received the Praemium Imperiale Prize in 2018.
