Smiling Nude, Cap d'Agde Print

Jan Chlebek is an influential Artist/Architect who has studied and exhibited widely in the UK and Europe. On gaining his Master of Arts (Painting) degree, he was the recipient of a British Council Scholarship to study Fine Art at Düsseldorf Academy of Art with Joseph Beuys, and subsequently invited to exhibit his work at London’s Serpentine Gallery. This show comprised four very large, floor to ceiling, wall-mounted painted constructions containing embedded referential images, which could be seen to replace the gallery walls and hence, metaphorically speaking, the Art establishment of the time. Motivated by seeing beyond the superficial image, Jan Chlebek’s interest in the relationships between surface and underlying structure led to the offer of a place at UCL’s Bartlett School of Architecture where he explored the links between the creation of buildings with that of painting and vice-versa, winning various competitions and awards for his innovative designs, including Interior Design and Photography. To develop this concept, i.e. the synthesis of historical and contemporary painting with architectural theory and design, he organised and curated a series of illustrated lectures on Art & Architecture by invited guests at London’s Art Net Gallery, reviews of which were published in various Art journals. After qualification as an Architect, whilst continuing to paint, he held various senior positions with leading international design consultancies, spending much of his time in the emerging Middle East. Having returned to Europe, Jan Chlebek now lives and works in London and the South of France where he concentrates on drawing, painting and photography, both of a figurative and abstract nature, engaging with process and medium to release new meanings in an ongoing investigation into the built environment and society as an art form.