CHRISTIAN DEVELTER

about the artist

Christian Develter, born 1968 in Blankenberge, Belgium is one of Belgium’s emerging stars already fast-gaining a reputation within the international art scene.

He initially studied art school at Ghent and was trained at the famous Antwerp Fashion Academy, soon to realize his passion for painting exceeded his love for designing clothes. Always joyful in composition, he presents a radiant kaleidoscope of shapes and forms. His choice to combine a rough passion with playful humour and bright colours recalls the artist’s view of popular fashions and trends.

Uniqueness lies in his radical choice for strong colours and mixture of oils and acrylics usually preferring to combine them with bold shapes. His works are deeply powerful and compelling in the way they capture light and space in translating the painter’s desire to create large paintings.

While in his early work the subject matters are more arbitrary, his more recent work is truly based on impressions experienced since his migration to Asia.

Each canvas emanates layers of turbulence in impeccable style and sensuality, the approach is highly emotional resulting in a visual feast. Seeing Chris’ work offers a clearer insight into his working process for under the modish contemporary façade, lies a classical working approach re-utilizing traditional painting techniques fashioned by the old Flemish Masters, thereby continuing an ancient tradition by daring repetition and innovation.

His radical choice for Asian themes places him under public scrutiny and critique from a new audience far away from his birthplace. By using highly unusual color combinations, but at the same time respecting Asian sensibilities, he truly proves himself of growing maturity while conveying deeper emotional resonance supporting his claim for a place in the Asian art scene. His enormous personal energy and optimism have endeared him to collectors worldwide.

Christians’ artistic development is definitely one to keep an eye on.

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ABOUT - THE CHIN SERIES

In 2012, Develter travelled the Northwestern area of Myanmar extensively and visited the remote tribes of the chin region. The inspiration for this iconic body of work comes from the intricately tattooed faces of the Chin women.

The Chin tribe and their tattoos are relatively unknown to the outside world. These different tribes in northwestern Myanmar (Chin and Rakhine State) use tattoo marks in a centuries’ old tradition to distinguish one hill tribe from another or indicate their marital status and social rank. Together with the Derung tribe in Southwest China’s Yunnan province, they are the only tribe know to adhere to this practice. Both tribes are from the same Indo-Tibetan lineage.

These multiplex patterns are carved into the skin by thorns using a mixture of sap from a local plant (sourced in the jungle for the color), ash and chicken blood or buffalo kidney. According to legends, these ornate tattoos were originally done so that Burmese Kings would not be able to steal women away as wives. They have however, evolved to become symbols of strength and beauty; reflecting nature – especially the animal and plant Kingdom - and the animist beliefs of the tribe.

Examples of these complex and delicate tattoos include:

Spider webs on the face
The sun of the forehead
Reptile skin on the face, especially on eyelids, nose & chin
Tiger whiskers bellow the nose
Peacock plumage fan on the forehead
Leopard dots on the face (…)

For generations women have been willing to submit themselves to the pain of this art for the beauty it represents to them and their tribe. Deep in the unforgiving hills and jungle of the Chin state tattoos are still being carved on faces of young girls coming to age despite being forbidden by the government. With the opening of Myanmar’s borders, these women will soon come to represent the last of their kind.

ABOUT - THE CIGAR SERIES

Christian’s iconic works are symbolic of the joy that emanates from them, including that of his world acclaimed ‘Cigar’ Series’ comprising of both Original Oil on Canvas Paintings sized at 1m x 1.2m to 1.5m x 1.7m and his Limited Edition Archival Lithographs. This renowned body of work are housed in some of the most prestigious Cigar Clubs and Lounges around the world, including that of the Mandarin Oriental Bangkok and the Raffles Hotel Phnom Penh. It is this Cigar Series which renowned cigar brand SIGLO has collaborated with Christian on to create their best-selling limited edition humidor collection. These unique handcrafted masterpieces are made from Spanish cedar wood finished with up to 15 layers of lacquer.

What is admirable beyond the choice of Christian’s subjects, is precisely th at stubbornness, which characterizes him, to be adamant in that hyper-finished, almost exaggerated style, specific to the make-up of dramatic stage and, of cinema as we know it between the nineteen thirties and the Nouvelle Vague. The recurrent light-hearted feeling, the absence of anguish, which can, arguably, reduce Develter to a "pop" or "glamorous", which others may refer to as a "fashion" painter. Yet beyond the choice of his subjects, is his calculated, almost mathematical use of colour, which brings an intense vibration and sensuality to his work which is at once festive.