Raoul De Keyser: Retour 1964-2006

by Steven Jacobs, Raoul De Keyser (Artist)

This substantial new volume offers a broad and representative picture of the oeuvre of the important Belgian painter Raoul De Keyser, who began his artistic career in the mid-1960s but did not gather international recognition for his abstract canvases until the late-80s. Consequently, much of his early work was never documented. For this volume, author Steven Jacobs spent years charting the early work, tracking it down and having it photographed. More than two-thirds of De Keyser's previously unseen work is documented here for the first time, alongside the artist's most important works and many canvases made since 2000. De Keyser is represented in New York by David Zwirner gallery. Of his 2004 exhibition there, Artforum's Michael Wilson wrote: "De Keyser has often been described as a "painter's painter," which might seem like faint praise but is accurate enough: The pleasures offered by his work are distinctly grown-up, unspectacular, refined, and satisfying. The influence of Miro and Klee is undeniable, but De Keyser remains contemporary in his concentration on the fragmentary and the left-behind, in his implicit acknowledgment of the impossibility of permanence or completion. His palette is timely too, often sharing celebrated countryman Luc Tuymans' dusty greens, pinks and creams."

256 pages, Hardcover

First published March 1, 2008

About the author

Steven Jacobs is an art historian specializing in the relationship between film and the visual arts. His research also focuses on the representation of architecture, the city and landscape in film and photography, as well as on themes in Belgian modern art history, including the work of Raoul De Keyser.
He has published internationally in journals such as Art Journal, October, History of Photography, The Journal of Architecture, Millennium Film Journal and De Witte Raaf. His books include Raoul De Keyser: Retour 1964–2006 (2007), The Wrong House: The Architecture of Alfred Hitchcock (2007), Framing Pictures: Film and the Visual Arts (2011), Screening Statues: Sculpture and Cinema (2017) and Art in the Cinema: The Mid-Century Art Documentary (2020).
Alongside his academic work, Jacobs has curated exhibitions for institutions including SMAK Ghent and Museum Arnhem, and has programmed films for KASK-Cinema, Cinema Zuid and Cinematek Brussels. He teaches modern art at Ghent University and film history at the University of Antwerp.