Michel Seuphor

Fernand Berckelaers was born in 1901 in Borgerhout, pseudonym Michel Seuphor was a Belgian painter. Seuphor established a literary magazine, Het Overzicht, in Antwerp in 1921. He moved in Dutch, Belgian and French avant-garde circles. He was associated at various points with Theo van Doesburg and Piet Mondrian, and was influenced by their iconic Neoplasticism works. Along with Joaquin Torres-Garcia and Pierre Daura, Seuphor founded the abstract artists' group Cercle et Carré. The group, which included luminaries such as Wassily Kandinsky and Le Corbusier. In 1934, Seuphor moved to Anduze in the South of France following his marriage. Seuphor wrote and edited three books; A Dictionary of Abstract Painting (Tudor Publishing Co., 1958), Abstract Painting: 50 Years of Accomplishment (Dell Laurel Edition, 1964) and The Sculpture of this Century (George Braziller, Inc. NY, 1960). These volumes, now out of print, remain among the most valuable documents of abstract painting & sculpture in the 20th century. Seuphor also assisted with the Tudor companion volume of his Dictionary of Abstract Painting, the Dictionary of Modern Painting, which documents all the various schools of painting in the 20th Century, including both abstract and realist painting. He also had his contemporary art collection with works of Marcelle Cahn, Adam Jankowski, Jean Piaubert, Jean Gorin, Jean Miotte, Aurélie Nemours and Victor Vasarely.