"Regards" by Pablo Rejas 1972

"Regards" by Pablo Rejas 1972. Oil on canvas. Signed and dated 1972. Revisited in July 1980, noted on the back. 54 X 73 cm. The artist, an engaged and passionate painter, defined himself as a working-class painter. There is much violence in his painting and in the interpretation of faces or clenched fists. Famous in Sarcelles for having left a mural and a large painting blending religion and secularism. A street and a nursery bear his name. He was born in May; should we see this as a sign... Pablo Rejas defines himself as a working-class painter. He was born to a Basque father and a Flemish mother in 1924. (1924-2019) He began working on drawing in the schools of Montparnasse and Montmartre. This existence was interrupted by the years of war, which marked his character and his will to defend peace. Above all, he is a painter of man for peace. From his years of heroic resistance, he does not wish to draw any praise, decoration, or merit. From his tumultuous professional journey—diver, stevedore, docker, lumberjack, and his qualities as a healer—Pablo Rejas draws from the depths of the human soul. From the 1950s onwards, he began to participate in numerous exhibitions, alone or in groups, notably alongside Bernard Lorjou and Yvonne Mottet. Inspired by a torn reality and his torments regarding a humanity that is capsizing, Pablo Rejas presents us with a frank and painful painting, passionate and troubled. As expressed by art critic Gérard Xuriguera, "the painting of Pablo Rejas is difficult and demanding. It exhorts humility and encourages us to look at ourselves without complacency, as we refuse to imagine ourselves. A painting that does not concern itself with anecdotal verisimilitude or esoteric speculation, it invests us and constrains us by the only forces it emits."