Panamarenko - Thermo Voltaic Energy Convertor - 2000s

Panamarenko - Thermo Voltaic Energy Convertor (2001).

Original offset print of the drawing “Thermo Voltaic Energy Convertor” by Panamarenko as shown on page 187 of the book “Panamarenko the retrospective!”, in the book numbered as drawing number 108.

Mounted in suspension and professionally framed in a black wooden frame.

Frame dimensions: 32 cm x 23 cm x 3 cm.

The drawing “Zonneauto” (Panamarenko 92: drawing no. 239) was regarded by Panamarenko as one of his finest drawings.

First shown during the exhibition “Thermo Photovoltaic Energy Convertor” on 21 October 2001 in the Winter Garden and the Verlatzaal of Antwerp Zoo, organized by Ronny Van de Velde.

Signed in the print.

Panamarenko, artist’s pseudonym of Henri Van Herwegen, is a Belgian sculptor. He is considered one of the leading Belgian sculptors of the second half of the 20th century. He produced many assemblages dealing with flying.

Panamarenko is a pseudonym and a contraction of "Pan American Airlines and Company". There was, however, also a Russian general in the Cold War named Panamarenko. The artist Henri Van Herwegen heard this name on the radio. Panamarenko’s family on the paternal side was communist. One of them was even the leader of the Belgian communists and died in the war from a V-1 flying bomb.

From 1955 to 1960 Panamarenko studied at the Antwerp Academy. Before 1968 he leaned toward pop art, but he soon became fascinated with the airplane and flying by one’s own power. Thus, since 1970, his scale-models of numerous imaginary vehicles, aircraft, balloons or helicopters in all kinds of original-surprising forms emerged. They are as many variants on the dream of flight by the mythological figure Icarus. Whether these devices can actually fly is part of the mystery and the attraction.

In the period 1969-1971 he built the zeppelin The Aeromodeller, and in 1990 the first Archaeopterix (an intelligent chicken) modeled on a prehistoric bird. In 1996 he presented the submarine Pahama Novaya Zemblaya. In the meantime he had already broken through internationally and organized solo exhibitions in London and Basel (in 2000) and in New York (2001). In 2003 his sculpture Pepto Bismo was inaugurated in Antwerp at Sint-Jansplein.

Conservator Jan Hoet paid particular attention to this artist at the SMAK museum in Ghent. In 2002 Panamarenko opened his new studio in Borgerhout (Antwerp), the Antwerp Airship Construction.

In 2005, at the opening of a large retrospective of his work in Brussels, Panamarenko announced his withdrawal from active artistry. The artists he admires include: Joseph Beuys, Marcel Broodthaers, Bruce Nauman and Pablo Picasso. Panamarenko married in 2003 Eveline Hoorens, who is 34 years his junior and heads the coffee roastery Hoorens.