Peter van den Braken - Circa 1950 - expressionist oil painting - summer evening landscape - signed - Sold

• Atmospheric oil on canvas painting depicting a summer evening falling over a city or village. Characteristic impasto (thick in the paint) expressionism by the Brabant painter Peter van den Braken. Signed in the paint at the bottom right and titled on the back. The painting and the original frame are in very good condition. Canvas size approx. 30x50cm (HxW).

Peter van den Braken, born in 1896 in Eindhoven and died there in 1979, knew at a young age that he wanted to become a painter. After jobs as a house and church painter, he developed as an autodidact, although the contacts with father Jan and son Anton Kruysen were stimulating for his artistic development. A successful exhibition in Scheveningen in 1922, where he was noticed by renowned art critics, was the beginning of a long series of exhibitions at home and abroad. He was a freebooter who was attached to his freedom. He lived in many places in the Netherlands and travelled all over the world, which led to an adventurous and restless life. In heart and soul he is and remains a Brabander who is devoted to his native soil, which is evident from his work - also what he produced along the way. Peter van den Braken's paintings are built up emotionally from colour; composition, line work and proportions are secondary. They do not arise from direct observation, but from sketches or from memory, so that detailing is omitted. Without delay he skillfully produces his work, which is robust and impetuous in character and which, by working directly from paint tubes and with a palette knife, has a pasty, grainy structure, which is his trademark. This `painting sculptor` is mainly concerned with evoking a characteristic mood or atmosphere in his landscapes and still lifes - he has hardly ever made portraits.

• Van den Braken (Eindhoven 1896 -1979) was an admirer of Vincent van Gogh. He learned the basics of painting from Jan Kruysen. However, he taught himself many painting techniques. In addition to watercolors and woodcuts, Peter van den Braken painted like a man possessed.
• At the age of twelve he decided to leave Brabant to travel the world to places like Brussels, Kortenhoef, Paris, London and Rome. A successful exhibition in Scheveningen in 1922 was the beginning of a long series of exhibitions at home and abroad. His impasto paintings are emotionally constructed from colour, composition, lines and proportions are secondary. Without hesitation he skillfully creates his work, which is sometimes robust and turbulent. This makes them expressionistic-impressionistic representations. Antoon Coolen will introduce most of his exhibitions for about ten years because the atmosphere of the paintings fits in with his own literary work.
• Later in life he worked for some time in North America, Canada and Mexico City. Back in the Netherlands he worked in Amsterdam, The Hague and Eindhoven and finally in Sterksel where an entire center is named after him. However, this center went bankrupt in 2020. He mainly painted landscapes (village views, cityscapes and harbor views) and still lifes, based on his memory and sketches. The impulsive, temperamental and restless character of the painter ensures that his work is of varying quality. Although he was a well-known artist, he has not always received the appreciation he deserves despite his honest artistry.