Corneille

GUILLAUME CORNELIS “CORNEILLE” VAN BEVERLOO (Liège, Belgium, 1922 – Auvers-sur-Oise, France, 2010).
“Autour de l’arbre magique,” 2002.
Woven wool rug. Edition of 125 copies.
Signed in the weft, in the upper section.
Piece marketed as a textile print by the artist.
Measurements: 200 x 270 cm.

Based on a composition that Corneille had previously developed in his graphic work, *Autour de l’arbre magique* is a notable example of the expansion of his pictorial language into the textile arts. Made of wool and produced in a limited edition of 125 pieces, the composition fully preserves the artist’s visual vocabulary and, thanks to its large format and the tactile nature of the medium, takes on a particularly decorative and monumental presence. Copies of this edition have been documented on the international market, confirming the circulation of this design within Corneille’s textile production.

The composition brings together much of the imagery that made Corneille’s mature work immediately recognizable: human figures, felines, birds, and plant forms coexist around a central tree within a space deliberately divorced from naturalistic perspective. The thick black outlines transform the surface into a succession of autonomous chromatic fields. When transferred to wool, these forms take on a material and tactile presence that accentuates the image’s monumental character without losing the graphic spontaneity of the original.

The motif is particularly representative of Corneille’s late work. Beginning in the late 1960s, the artist returned to a poetic style of figurative art that was frequently populated by women, birds, felines, vegetation, and celestial bodies, constructing a colorful universe that he would maintain until his final years. The Cobra Museum highlights precisely these motifs as an essential part of his mature artistic vocabulary.

Corneille was one of the founders of the CoBrA group in 1948, alongside Karel Appel, Constant, Asger Jorn, Christian Dotremont, and Joseph Noiret—a movement that was pivotal to the renewal of postwar European art and an advocate for spontaneous creation free from academic conventions. Throughout his career, he expanded his artistic language from painting and graphic art to ceramics, objects, and textiles, always maintaining the power of color and an imagery inspired by nature, travel, and the human figure. His historical significance has been the subject of major retrospectives, including “Corneille 100,” organized by the Cobra Museum of Modern Art to mark the centennial of his birth.