Serge Vollin

Luis Ross Gallery

Serge Vollin "Dark Nights" 11 October - 10 November 2001

Serge Vollin's richly colored paintings are steeped in the memory of his early life in Algeria, forced out by dreams and nightmares. His troubled mind conjures up forms and figures during long, sleepless nights. At once disjointed, faceless and terrifying, his subjects are often humorous and endearing. This series of acrylic paintings were done mostly during the artist's hospitalization in a Munich psychiatric institute, where he refused traditional help. Artistic creation was substituted for normal therapy.

Source:Mycelium

http://www.mycelium-fr.com/#/serge-vollin-accueil/3741430

Né Chérif Ben Amor, à Messaouda, dans le massif des Aurès (Algérie), le 20 décembre 1946.

Fils d’un propriétaire terrien qui mourra assassiné et confié à une belle-mère méchante après la répudiation de sa mère, Serge Vollin a été durement éprouvé par la guerre de libération de son pays natal, qu’il raconte en images naïves dans un livre paru en octobre 2004, Mes Aurès. Le 1er novembre 1954, son instituteur, M. Monnerot, est la première victime civile des hostilités : redevenu berger dans la montagne, il n’ira plus jamais à l’école. Plus tard c’est son beau-père, que l’on tuera une nuit sous ses yeux.

Peu après la fin de la guerre, il prend le bateau pour la France et s’installe dans les montagnes, à Grenoble, où il se marie avec une fleuriste et change de nom. La suite de son histoire le mènera à Munich, en Allemagne, où il épouse en secondes noces Rose-Marie, a un fils, Philippe, et devient un artiste reconnu dans le circuit de l’art outsider autodidacte.

Peintre naïf visionnaire, excellent coloriste, Serge Vollin ne sait pas dessiner au sens académique, mais les images qui le hantent sont si fortes qu’il trouve toujours un moyen schématique de les exprimer. Après une série de « Nus », il prépare actuellement un second livre qui sera consacré à sa vie en Europe et à l’univers de la psychiatrie.

Translation from French to English with Google translate, unedited:

Born Cherif Ben Amor, to Messaouda, in the Massif des Aures (Algeria), December 20, 1946.

The son of a landowner who died murdered and placed in a wicked stepmother after the repudiation of his mother, Serge Vollin has been hard hit by the war of liberation of his homeland, he tells in naive images in a book published in October 2004, My Aures. On 1 November 1954, his teacher, Mr. Monnerot, is the first civilian victim of war: again become a shepherd in the mountains, he will never at school. Later it was her stepfather, we will kill one night before his eyes.

Shortly after the war ended, he took ship for France and settled in the mountains, in Grenoble, where he married a florist and changes its name. Following the lead of its history in Munich, Germany, where he married his second wife Rose-Marie, a son, Philip, and became a recognized artist in the art circuit self-taught outsider.

Naive visionary painter, excellent colorist, Serge Vollin can not draw in the academic sense, but the images that haunt him are so strong that it always finds a way to express schematic. After a series of "Naked", he is currently preparing a second book to be dedicated to his life in Europe and the world of psychiatry.