Marthe Wéry: Work, studies and documents in the BPS22 collections

More than ten years after the Les Couleurs du Monochrome (Monochrome Colours) exhibit, hosted by BPS22 at the Tournai Beaux-Arts Museum, as part of Lille 2004, European Capital of Culture, the great Belgian artist, Marthe Wéry is again the subject of a major retrospective. In Charleroi, this time! From her first geometric paintings to great monochrome ensembles, and including ruled paper and scraped paintings, BPS22 is presenting visitors with the work by this artist who has subtly and without concession explored all the possibilities of the base components of painting.

As the custodian of three ensembles (1974, 1987, 1995–2004) belonging to the Hainaut Province (50 pieces in total) that are emblematic of Marthe Wéry’s work, BPS22 now has the largest collection of the artist’s works. It represents all her periods, as well as some very rare sketches from the 1950s and engravings from the 1960s. This unequalled collection is completed with many studies, conducted throughout her career, as well as archives.

Designed based on the BPS22 collections, the exhibit shows Marthe Wéry’s entire oeuvre, with special attention to pieces and ensembles that have never been shown or have only rarely been shown. Through the various “movements” “of a work”—to use two expressions from the artist—which extends over nearly 50 years, we can discover the ongoing preoccupations of an artist guided by a rare, radical nature and long-standing questions.