Jacques Calonne (10 August 1930 – 7 February 2022) was a Belgian artist, composer, singer, actor,

logogram In a written language, a logogram, logograph, or lexigraph is a written character that represents a word or morpheme. Chinese characters (pronounced '' hanzi'' in Mandarin, ''kanji'' in Japanese, ''hanja'' in Korean) are generally logograms, ...

ist, and writer.

Life

Born in Mons, Calonne studied music from 1944 until 1946 at the conservatories of Mons and Brussels, with amongst others the composer

André Souris André Souris (; 10 July 1899 – 12 February 1970) was a Belgian composer, conductor, musicologist, and writer associated with the surrealist movement. Biography Souris was born in Marchienne-au-Pont, Belgium, and studied at the Conservatory ...

, who introduced him to the

surrealist Surrealism is a cultural movement that developed in Europe in the aftermath of World War I in which artists depicted unnerving, illogical scenes and developed techniques to allow the unconscious mind to express itself. Its aim was, according to ...

movement. He then pursued a course of art studies at the

Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts The Royal Academy of Fine Arts of Brussels (french: Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts - École supérieure des Arts de la Ville de Bruxelles (ARBA-ESA), nl, Koninklijke Academie voor Schone Kunsten van Brussel), is an art school established in B ...

in Brussels from 1947 to 1949, when he attended ''La fin et les moyens'' (The End and the Means), the first Belgian exhibition of the COBRA group at the Palais des Beaux-Arts de Bruxelles, where he met

Christian Dotremont Christian Dotremont, (; 12 December 1922 – 20 August 1979), was a Belgian painter and poet who was born in Tervuren, Belgium. He was a founding member of the Revolutionary Surrealist Group (1946) and he also founded COBRA together with Danis ...

. He immediately attached himself to this movement, becoming its youngest member and taking part in its meetings in the rue de la Paille, as well as in its review and at the exposition "L'Objet à travers les âges" (The Object through the Ages). Dividing himself between music and visual arts, he continued to pursue a double career after the dissolution of COBRA. In 1954 he made his first visit to the

Internationale Ferienkurse für neue Musik "The Internationale" (french: "L'Internationale", italic=no, ) is an international anthem used by various communist and socialist groups; currently, it serves as the official anthem of the Communist Party of China. It has been a standard of th ...

at Darmstadt, where he met

Karlheinz Stockhausen Karlheinz Stockhausen (; 22 August 1928 – 5 December 2007) was a German composer, widely acknowledged by critics as one of the most important but also controversial composers of the 20th-century classical music, 20th and early 21st-century ...

and

Bruno Maderna Bruno Maderna (21 April 1920 – 13 November 1973) was an Italian conductor and composer. Life Maderna was born Bruno Grossato in Venice but later decided to take the name of his mother, Caterina Carolina Maderna.Interview with Maderna‘s th ...

. In 1956 he exhibited paintings at the World Congress of Free Artists in

Alba ''Alba'' ( , ) is the Scottish Gaelic name for Scotland. It is also, in English language historiography, used to refer to the polity of Picts and Scots united in the ninth century as the Kingdom of Alba, until it developed into the Kingdom ...

. He is, for all the manifestations of

avant-garde The avant-garde (; In 'advance guard' or ' vanguard', literally 'fore-guard') is a person or work that is experimental, radical, or unorthodox with respect to art, culture, or society.John Picchione, The New Avant-garde in Italy: Theoretical ...

, not so very much a nonconformist. In 1957, he co-signed the "Manifesto against Style" with, amongst others, Serge Vandercam, Pierre Restany,

Yves Klein Yves Klein (; 28 April 1928 – 6 June 1962) was a French artist and an important figure in post-war European art. He was a leading member of the French artistic movement of Nouveau réalisme founded in 1960 by art critic Pierre Restany. Klein w ...

, Roel d'Haese, and

Pierre Alechinsky Pierre Alechinsky (born 19 October 1927) is a Belgian artist. He has lived and worked in France since 1951. His work is related to tachisme, abstract expressionism, and lyrical abstraction. Life Alechinsky was born in Schaerbeek. In 1944 he ...

. In 1964, he began publishing his writings (e.g., the novel ''Belle que jamais'', published in ''Strates'', one of Dotremont's journals) while continuing his musical activities. His 1959 composition ''Quadrangles'' was performed on 24 January 1965 at the

Wallraf–Richartz Museum The Wallraf–Richartz Museum (full name in German: ') is one of the three major museums in Cologne, Germany. It houses an art gallery with a collection of fine art from the medieval period to the early twentieth century. History The museum ...

in Cologne, in the concert series of the second Cologne Courses for New Music. In 1971, he created the first of his ink-on-music-paper works and published sixteen

lithographs Lithography () is a planographic method of printing originally based on the immiscibility of oil and water. The printing is from a stone (lithographic limestone) or a metal plate with a smooth surface. It was invented in 1796 by the German a ...

, with the title "Muettes", in the ''Daily Bul''. In the following year, he resumed painting in

oils An oil is any nonpolar chemical substance that is composed primarily of hydrocarbons and is hydrophobic (does not mix with water) & lipophilic (mixes with other oils). Oils are usually flammable and surface active. Most oils are unsaturate ...

on paper and fabric, and exhibited at the

Venice Biennale The Venice Biennale (; it, La Biennale di Venezia) is an international cultural exhibition hosted annually in Venice, Italy by the Biennale Foundation. The biennale has been organised every year since 1895, which makes it the oldest of ...

. Perpetuating the spirit of Cobra, he employed the principle of nonspecialization, cherished by the group, creating

s together with Dotremont. In 1981, he painted on assemblages of match boxes. Though he exhibited in 1949 as a member of Cobra, his first one-man show was mounted only in 1970 at the Dierickx gallery in Brussels. Subsequently, he exhibited many times in this city, where he lived in the working-class neighbourhood of Marolles. He frequently participated in collective exhibitions in Belgium and abroad. His graphic and pictorial work is in the tradition of the plastic practice of writing which developed in Belgium. The rhythm of the elements, the musicality of their distribution in the appropriation of space, and extreme scriptuary fluidity of the symbols reveal the very personal contribution of this musician who painted and drew visual scores. In 1995 he played the rôle of the Representative of the Ministry of Culture in the 1996 film ''

Camping Cosmos ''Camping Cosmos'' is a 1996 Belgian satirical comedy film and a sequel to ''La Vie sexuelle des Belges 1950-1978'', directed by the same director: Jan Bucquoy. It stars Claude Semal, Lolo Ferrari (Miss Vandeputte), Noël Godin (Pierre Mertens), H ...

''. Calonne died in Brussels on 7 February 2022, at the age of 91.

Compositions (selective list)

*''Quadrangles'', for piano (1959) *''Un autre monde'', film score (Vandercam & Dotremont 1959) *''Album'', for string quartet (6 vols., 1960s) *''Tome'', for 2 pianos and 3 percussionists (1962) *''Scolies'', for chamber ensemble (ca. 1964) *''Orbes'' for orchestra (1965) *''Le Pavillon des passions humaines'', film score (Claude François, 1988) *''Emergence des avant-gardes en Belgique francophone'', film score (1990)

Writings

*1968. "Aspects d'un resume (Apropos d' ''Orbes pour orchestre'')". ''Revue d'Esthetique'' 21, nos. 2–4 ("Musiques nouvelles"): 59–103. *1991. ''Facéties et compagnie de Christian Dotremont''. Préface de Pierre Alechinsky, mise en page de Michel Olyff. Brussels: Quadri Gallery.

Discography

*Calonne, Jacques. 1988. ''Tenor Mondain''. Recorded in 1983. Notes by Jean-Pierre Van Tieghem. Igloo IGL 071 (LP)

References

Sources * * * * * *

Life

Compositions (selective list)

Writings

Discography

References

Further reading