Oil painting Sunflowers Gust Smet, Belgium 1960s

Description

Oil painting on panel, sunflowers by Gust Smet (1911-1997)

Signed Gust Smet, dating around the 1960s
Good condition, some damage to the frame, see photos

Afmeting: 87 x 67 x 5.5cm
Paneel is 75 x 55cm

Gust (August) Smet was a Belgian artist, born in Sint-Niklaas in 1911 and died in Lokeren in 1997. He was a painter and draftsman. Smet received his training at the Academy in Sint-Niklaas under the guidance of A. Proost, S. Wynants, and A. Horenbant (1922-1934). He then continued his studies at Sint-Lucas and Ter Kameren in Brussels.
His works from the 1950s show influences of Braque, Ernst, and Chagall. Later, he painted landscapes and his style evolved towards the fantastic and phantasmagie. From the press: "With the landscapes and still lifes of the 1960s, GS was not concerned with a faithful representation of reality, but rather with the expression of the inner sensing of the real point of reference. That inner emotionality has remained the core of his later work, with which he clearly broke through the regional circle." He painted compositions with figures that exude fantasy, in which intriguing characters and plants appear.