From April 1 to 17 June 2012, the Roger Raveel Museum is exhibiting a series of works from the Thomas Neirynck Collection. The exhibition, entitled « Abstract? De aard van het schilderen », focuses on the work of 5 artists: Eugène Leroy, Roger Raveel, Tal Coat, Bram van Velde and Maurice Wyckaert. Through the paintings of these artists, the Raveel Museum sets out to show the transition that took place in the visual arts during the years 1950-60 from figurative to abstract, and vice versa.

The relationship between figurative and abstract was a remarkable phenomenon in post-World War II art. The five artists whose work is highlighted in this exhibition share the indisputably common characteristic of starting from the observation of reality. Contacts between the artists, at both personal and professional level, also conditioned the development of their art.

Through several aspects of the exhibition, a central role is accorded to works of Maurice Wyckaert, Tal Coat and Bram van Velde from the Neirynck Collection. On the one hand, because the Thomas Neirynck Collection is the acknowledged collection of reference for abstract art in post-World War II Belgium, and on the other hand because it is a collection in which the relationships between the various artists have a certain importance.

This exhibition deals with the work of key artists, who lived through the Second World War and who were also decisive influences on the development of the visual arts during the ten years that followed the war.