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Beautiful pastel,
A summer landscape of Crete
FRANS VAN VEEN (Voorburg, 1950) was educated at the St. Joost Academy in Breda and at the Royal Academy of Art and Design in 's Hertogenbosch. Initially he painted meticulously, in a hyperrealistic style. In this way he tried to investigate the relationship between nature and culture. For this work he received the Royal Subsidy for Free Painting in 1977.
In the eighties came the change in his work from pure realism to his current, lyrical way of working. He has developed his own method in which he makes large paintings in pastel chalk in nature that later form the basis for the paintings in oil paint in his studio.
As a true plein air painter, he captures the intensity of the moment in pastels outside in nature, “sur le motif”, as Cézanne said. In these pastels he depicts the landscape in his own impressionistic way. In the expressive oil paintings he gives the experience of nature an extra dimension by means of a powerful brushstroke.