Jean Michel Atlan Ohne Titel Oil on canvas 73 x 116 cm Framed. Signed and dated 'Atlan 58' in black lower right. - Inconspicuous craquelure in the pastose white areas. Polieri 664 Provenance Private collection; Loudmer, Paris, Auction 20 June 1985, Lot XV.; Private collection; Galerie Sander, Darmstadt (with stretcher label); Private collection, Hesse Literature French Studies Contemporary Art, USA, Yale University 1958 (according to information from Polieri) “With me it's rhythm, not superficial line rhythm, but the rhythm that creates forms, a rhythm that encounters coloured matter in a field of contradiction and resistance. [...] My work: perseverance, the invention of forms arising from more and more liberated rhythms but which nonetheless take place in an area of very articulate architecture.” (Atlan, cited in: Jacques Polieri, Atlan. Catalogue Raisonne of the complete works, Paris 1996, p. 641). In the final years of the 1950s - after he had achieved his international breakthrough as well as recognition for his specific accomplishment and his individual contribution to the development of abstract painting in France - the artist nonetheless began to make an increasing number of statements shortly before his early death, at the age of 47, in which he sought to set his work apart and counter its direct assimilation through the all too fashionable concepts of the then-thriving art business and the “Ecole de Paris”. Atlan was of Algerian descent and saw himself as rooted in the art of Africa; he felt a closer kinship with the remote art of the Assyrians and Etruscans and finally referred to himself as a “shaman” whose art was, so to speak, comprised of wildness, magic, energetic abundance and primal forces. He equated his painting with abstract dance and the absolute “rhythm”. In 1958 Atlan had withdrawn to the country and was sometimes working simultaneously on multiple canvasses in his new studio: these then merged into impulsively dynamic diptychs and triptychs. His painting drew its dynamism from its format and the tautening of its internal structure, from the antagonism between line and shape, ground and figure - in his best pictures, his individual colour backgrounds and his black symbols on the picture plane enter into a seemingly enchanted spatial dialogue. However, it is not so much harmonious as disruptive and vigorous elements and movements which guide his expression. Jean Michel Atlan Ohne Titel Öl auf Leinwand 73 x 116 cm Gerahmt. Unten rechts schwarz signiert und datiert 'Atlan 58'. - In den weißen pastosen Partien mit unauffälligem Craquelé. Polieri 664 Provenienz Privatsammlung; Loudmer, Paris, Auktion 20.6.1985, Lot XV.; Privatsammlung; Galerie Sander, Darmstadt (mit Keilrahmenaufkleber); Privatsammlung Hessen Literatur French Studies Contemporary Art, USA, Yale University 1958 (nach den Angaben bei Polieri) "With me it's rhythm, not superficial line rhythm, but the rhythm that creates forms, a rhythm that encounters coloured matter in a field of contradiction and resistance. (...) My work: perseverance, the invention of forms arising from more and more liberated rhythms but which nonetheless take place in an area of very articulate architecture." (Atlan, zit. nach: Jacques Polieri, Atlan. Catalogue Raisonne of the complete works, Paris 1996, S. 641). In den ausgehenden 1950er Jahren, nach dem erzielten internationalen Durchbruch und der Anerkennung seiner spezifischen Leistung und seines individuellen Beitrages zur Entwicklung abstrakter Malerei in Frankreich, mehrten sich dennoch kurz vor seinem frühen Tod mit 47 Jahren die abgrenzenden Statements des Künstlers. Er suchte damit einer direkten Vereinnahmung durch allzu modische Begrifflichkeiten des damals heiß laufenden Kunstbetriebes und der "Ecole de Paris" zu begegnen. Atlan, algerischer Abstammung, sah sich selbst verwurzelt mit der Kunst Afrikas, er fühlte sich der fernen Kunst der Assyrer und Etrusker eher verwandt und bezeichnete sich letztendlich selbst als einen "Schamanen", dessen Kunst Wildheit, Magie, energetische Fülle und Urgewalten quasi umfasste. Er setzte seine Malerei dem abstrakten Tanz und dem absoluten "Rhythmus" gleich. 1958 hatte Atlan sich aufs Land zurückgezogen und arbeitete in seinem neuen Atelier zuweilen auf mehreren Leinwänden gleichzeitig, die sich zu impulsiv bewegten Diptychen und Triptychen fügten. Seine Malerei gewann aus dem Format und der sich verspannenden Binnenstruktur, aus dem Antagonismus von Linie und Fläche, von Grund und Figur ihre Beweglichkeit, wobei in seinen besten Gemälden seine individuellen Farbgründe und seine schwarzen Zeichen auf der Bildfläche in einen wie verzauberten räumlichen Dialog treten. Es sind jedoch weniger harmonische, sondern disruptive wie kraftvolle Elemente und Bewegungen, die seinen Ausdruck leiten.