Angelos - Biography

Biography

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Jan Fabre is an artist, theatre-maker and author. He was born in Antwerp in 1958. In the late seventies he studied at the Royal Academy of Fine Art and the Municipal Institute of Decorative Arts and Crafts in Antwerp. His first works date from that period.

Jan Fabre makes installations, sculptures, drawings, films and performances. Over the years he has built up a sizeable body of work and has become internationally acclaimed.

His best-known works include Tivoli (1990, Mechelen), a mansion covered entirely in ballpoint drawing, The man who measures the clouds (1998), a bronze sculpture, versions of which can be seen at S.M.A.K. in Ghent, deSingel in Antwerp, the 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art, Kanazawa and in the sculpture garden at Catanzaro in Italy; and not least Heaven of Delight (2002), a permanent work commissioned by Queen Paola of Belgium for the Mirror Hall at the Royal Palace in Brussels.

Fabre has taken part in such major international exhibitions as the Venice Biennale (1984, 1990 and 2003), Documenta in Kassel (1987 and 1992), the Sao Paolo Biennale (1991), the Lyon Biennale (2000), the Valencia Biennale (2001) and the Istanbul Biennale (1992 and 2001). Other recent and leading exhibitions are Anthropology of a Planet at Palazzo Benzon, Venice (2007), Jan Fabre au Louvre. L'Ange de la métamorphose (2008), From the Cellar to the Attic. From the Feet to the Brain at Kunsthaus Bregenz (2008), From the Feet to the Brain in Venice venue Arsenale Novissimo (2009), Art kept me out of jail. Performance installations by Jan Fabre 2001-2004-2008 at M HKA (2010) and Alternative humanities: Jan Fabre & Katsura Funakoshi at 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art, Kanazawa (2010).

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