Gerard Bontemps 

Gerard Bontemps was born in Petit Quevilly, near Rouen, on August 22, 1944. Since 1982 his works have been displayed in numerous exhibitions and galleries, including the Salon d'Automne, the Salon Violet in Paris and the Salon des Artistes Normands in Rouen. As a high school, student Bontemps was recognized as a young talent by painting and drawing teacher Henri Sergent, who helped him join the Beaux-Arts of Rouen.  In 1975 he befriended Jeff Friboulet, the renowned Norman painter/sculpter who had already trained many a young artist, and under his tutelage Bontemps refined his technique while also learning how to assert his own artistic vision.  Gerard Bontemps has depicted his share of people and landscapes, but his preference is undoubtedly still life, as it is the genre that allows him to restore to nature its inherent liveliness while also catering to his taste for artistic construction. Starting with somber nakedness of black canvas, Gerard Bontemps does no less than recreate space itself. Then, through vision and acrylic paint, he weaves a seamless ensemble of cubism, expressionism and nabism, all the while maintaining a sense of structure that supports both harmony and light.  Possessing a scientific mastery of color and its effects, Gerard Bontemps simultaneously arranges and diversifies the simplest of elements in such a way as to provoke a childlike fascination through the side-by-side placement of charm and certitude. Never repeating the same theme twice, his sound knowledge of value and balance infuse each and every one of his paintings with creative and enthusiastic originality.