Karel Vereycken · Winner Collectors Art Prize
Born in 1957 in Antwerp, Belgium, Karel graduated from the Institut Saint-Luc in Brussels and trained in engraving at the Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts, where he obtained a certificate of passage « with distinction. »
In France, as a member of the Fédération nationale de l’estampe, he confirmed his technical mastery at Atelier63 and continued to perfect his skills in the Paris workshop of Danish engraver Bo Halbirk.
Karel's parents worked in the port and the ship repair industry. Their adolescence, studies and careers were reduced to zero by the war period and the need to bring an income and feed their brothers, parents and family. So for their children, they wanted them to have the occasion to fully enjoy and explore the cultural dimensions.
His mother, who was prevented by the war to become an opera singer, got Karel into a music school. But at that time, the teaching methods, basically learning to read scores for two years before ever being allowed to sing, were so repugnant that I ran away from that. As an alternative, his mother sent Karel to a communal drawing school directed by a talented sculptor named Herman Cornelis. The bearded cigar-smoking giant would rip pages out of old books and stick them in Karel's hands saying “copy this!”
At age 12, Karel won his first art prize and his teacher convinced his mother “there was precious talent” in her son. With that advice, his mother sent him to Brussels to attend the Saint Luke Art School and study Plastic Arts. Some teachers were quite annoying but others got us into deep study of anatomy, examining Leonardo da Vinci and Albrecht Dürer’s groundbreaking studies. Karel continued another two years at the Ecole Royale des Beaux Arts of Brussels to study copper engraving and got graduated “with distinction.”
Karel then moved to Paris and worked as a journalist and editor of a non-commercial militant paper. But after some years, I found out art was really lacking in my life so I returned to it. First by producing copies of old masters painting on wooden oak panels with hand-made egg tempera, Venetian turpentine and various other ancient oil techniques he rediscovered with a schoolmate.
Since the people that ordered these painting took them home, at the end, the artist had nothing to put on show. Therefore, Karel returned to watercolors and etching. He also gave a three year course of drawing for some of his friends, mainly amateurs and beginners.
The Return of Poseidon, 2022. Watercolor an Arches paper, 80 x 60 cm.
Stairway to Heaven, 2018. Etching on zinc, 50 x 70 cm.
Abbey of Vallemagne, 2024. Watercolor on Arches paper, 58 x 70 cm.
The Death of Melancolia, 2022. Etching on zinc, 80 x 60 cm.
Ambiance Haussman, 2024. Etching on zinc,
