Jules Atarax (1985) - Behind the smile
04
days
19
hours
36
minutes
57
seconds
Current bid
€ 3
No reserve price
Expert
Selected by David Elberg
Spent five years as a Classic Art Expert and three years as a commissaire-priseur.
Estimate € 800 - € 1,000
 | €3 | |
|---|---|---|
 | €2 |
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Jules Atarax (1985) presents the original, signed mixed-media artwork Behind the smile, an oil and acrylic gestural painting on canvas in the Expressionism style, 50 x 60 cm, from the 2010–2020 period, sold by Galerie.
AI-assisted summary
Description from the seller
Behind the Smile explores the contrast between appearance and inner emotion. Dominated by an intensely red palette, the work features a front-facing figure whose deliberately exaggerated smile oscillates between warmth, mask, and concealment. It is the artist's first self-portrait, created in 2021.
The face seems to emerge from a circular movement of matter where each brushstroke contributes to a sense of continuous energy. The eyes, built from layers of greens, blues and grays, become the true emotional center of the composition. They capture the gaze without ever fully revealing their secret.
Cross-shaped marks on either side of the face introduce a symbolic dimension that reinforces the overall ambiguity. They may evoke boundaries, wounds, landmarks, or simply pictorial signs, leaving the viewer free to construct their own interpretation.
The painting is executed in a gestural and instinctive writing where the material remains fully visible. The overlays, transparencies and brushstrokes testify to a search for authenticity, prioritizing emotional intensity over realistic representation.
Between contemporary expressionism and symbolic figuration, Behind the Smile questions what each person chooses to show to the world and what remains hidden behind appearances.
This work counts among the very latest canvases currently available by Jules Atarax, while all of the artist’s recent pieces have already been acquired, this rare availability offers the collector a privileged opportunity to acquire an original work at a stage when the available production becomes extremely limited.
A rare opportunity before the complete disappearance of this series from the market.
His works are in private collections in the USA, Switzerland, Poland, Sweden, Ireland, Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands, France, Spain and Italy.
We offer on Catawiki the latest pieces available from this period 2019-2024.
Format: 50 x 70 cm
Technique: gestural painting on canvas oil and acrylic
Unique work
Seller's Story
We believe that art is not an image.
There is a presence.
A work exists when a human being inhabits matter. When a glance, a hand, hesitation, or intention cross the color. Painting is not a surface to fill, but a place where something alive takes shape.
We refuse non-being.
We reject images without flesh, forms without experience, productions that imitate without feeling. A creation can be technically perfect and yet empty. Perfection without presence is an absence.
What we fight against is not technology.
It is the disappearance of the sensitive.
We defend slowness, doubt, and trace.
The hand that trembles.
The color that lasts.
The gesture that fails then starts again.
It is in this friction between spirit and matter that art is born. Where something is risky. Where something is true.
Painting is an act of resistance.
Resistance to the automation of perception.
Resistance to the uniformity of beauty.
Resistance to forgetting what it means to feel.
Creating is asserting one's existence.
We believe that human feelings are not simulated.
They feel for each other.
They are registering.
They leave a mark
A work bears the weight of those who have traversed it. It contains time, attention, fatigue, joy, and sometimes pain. That is what we seek. That is what we want to convey.
Faced with purely artificial creations, we choose incarnation.
Faced with noise, we choose depth.
Facing speed, we choose accuracy.
As long as there is color, there will be humanity.
This manifesto is not nostalgia.
It's a line.
A line between the image and the work.
Between calculation and presence.
Between the simulated and the lived experience.
We do not make images.
We make human existence exist through color.
And as long as a human hand inhabits matter, art will remain alive.
Translated by Google TranslateBehind the Smile explores the contrast between appearance and inner emotion. Dominated by an intensely red palette, the work features a front-facing figure whose deliberately exaggerated smile oscillates between warmth, mask, and concealment. It is the artist's first self-portrait, created in 2021.
The face seems to emerge from a circular movement of matter where each brushstroke contributes to a sense of continuous energy. The eyes, built from layers of greens, blues and grays, become the true emotional center of the composition. They capture the gaze without ever fully revealing their secret.
Cross-shaped marks on either side of the face introduce a symbolic dimension that reinforces the overall ambiguity. They may evoke boundaries, wounds, landmarks, or simply pictorial signs, leaving the viewer free to construct their own interpretation.
The painting is executed in a gestural and instinctive writing where the material remains fully visible. The overlays, transparencies and brushstrokes testify to a search for authenticity, prioritizing emotional intensity over realistic representation.
Between contemporary expressionism and symbolic figuration, Behind the Smile questions what each person chooses to show to the world and what remains hidden behind appearances.
This work counts among the very latest canvases currently available by Jules Atarax, while all of the artist’s recent pieces have already been acquired, this rare availability offers the collector a privileged opportunity to acquire an original work at a stage when the available production becomes extremely limited.
A rare opportunity before the complete disappearance of this series from the market.
His works are in private collections in the USA, Switzerland, Poland, Sweden, Ireland, Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands, France, Spain and Italy.
We offer on Catawiki the latest pieces available from this period 2019-2024.
Format: 50 x 70 cm
Technique: gestural painting on canvas oil and acrylic
Unique work
Seller's Story
We believe that art is not an image.
There is a presence.
A work exists when a human being inhabits matter. When a glance, a hand, hesitation, or intention cross the color. Painting is not a surface to fill, but a place where something alive takes shape.
We refuse non-being.
We reject images without flesh, forms without experience, productions that imitate without feeling. A creation can be technically perfect and yet empty. Perfection without presence is an absence.
What we fight against is not technology.
It is the disappearance of the sensitive.
We defend slowness, doubt, and trace.
The hand that trembles.
The color that lasts.
The gesture that fails then starts again.
It is in this friction between spirit and matter that art is born. Where something is risky. Where something is true.
Painting is an act of resistance.
Resistance to the automation of perception.
Resistance to the uniformity of beauty.
Resistance to forgetting what it means to feel.
Creating is asserting one's existence.
We believe that human feelings are not simulated.
They feel for each other.
They are registering.
They leave a mark
A work bears the weight of those who have traversed it. It contains time, attention, fatigue, joy, and sometimes pain. That is what we seek. That is what we want to convey.
Faced with purely artificial creations, we choose incarnation.
Faced with noise, we choose depth.
Facing speed, we choose accuracy.
As long as there is color, there will be humanity.
This manifesto is not nostalgia.
It's a line.
A line between the image and the work.
Between calculation and presence.
Between the simulated and the lived experience.
We do not make images.
We make human existence exist through color.
And as long as a human hand inhabits matter, art will remain alive.
Translated by Google TranslateDetails
Artist
Jules Atarax (1985)
Sold with frame
No
Sold by
Gallery
Edition
Original
Title of artwork
Behind the smile
Technique
Mixed media
Signature
Hand signed
Country of origin
Belgium
Condition
Excellent condition
Height
50 cm
Width
60 cm
Style
Expressionism
Period
2010-2020
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