In May 2016, the Eleanor D. Wilson Museum at Hollins University was the recipient of a collection of 385 preliminary paintings, drawings, and prints by Jean Hélion (French, 1904-1987), a gift from the Blair family. This is the largest gift in the history of the Eleanor D. Wilson Museum and an important collection of studies by one of France’s noted modernists.
French by birth, Hélion married an American from Virginia and spent time living and working in the United States. He lived off and on in Virginia from 1936-1940 and returned in 1942 during WWII after escaping from a German prison-ship to work in New York City. He left the United States in 1946 and spent the rest of his life in France.
This exhibition will present selections from this generous gift, most of which has never been exhibited to the public. This collection makes Hollins University a major repository for Hélion studies.
The artist is best known in France for experimenting with the various looks of early modernism, but recently several international exhibits in Paris and New York have created new interest in the artist. His early works have always been sought after and collected by museums and private collectors around the world. His figurative work from the middle to the late twentieth century, unorthodox at the time it was created, is currently being reexamined.
Hélion mostly worked in series, visually exploring and observing every detail that went into a finished painting. Everyday scenes featuring food items (pumpkins, baguettes), the female figure, shop windows, flea markets, people under umbrellas, and reading newspapers were common subjects within Hélion’s works.
In the forty works selected for this exhibition we get a feel for the large movements in Hélion’s art. These drawings range from simple but expressive lines to detailed drawings in graphite, charcoal, colored pencil, or pastel, and heightened with watercolors. They render almost every detail found in the finished work. The viewer can almost see in these works the inner functions of Hélion’s mind searching for the ideal composition, color, and expression.
Hélion Highlights: Selections from the Blair Family Gift opens to the public on Thursday, February 2nd and is on view in the Wilson gallery of the museum through Sunday, March 26.
The public is also invited to join the Eleanor D. Wilson Museum on Sunday, February 5th at 3:00 pm in the Frances Neiderer Auditorium of the Richard Wetherill Visual Arts Center for a lecture by Ron Boehmer for the concurrent exhibition Views of Tinker Mountain by Ron Boehmer. A reception will follow in the first floor lobby from 4:00-5:00pm for the public opening of both exhibitions.
