French painter with a complex artistic career, Jean Hélion was instrumental in introducing abstract art to the United States. He initially focused on volume, movement and rhythm, and became close to Mondrian, Léger and then Calder. It was through contact with painters such as Joaquin Torres Garcia and Perre Créixams that the artist discovered Cubism in 1926. Jean Hélion held his first exhibition in 1932, presenting mostly abstractions. After a first stay in the United States in 1932, he became one of the major players in abstraction, both as a theorist and practitioner. He exhibited in NewYork. 

In 1946, Jean Hélion his definitively abandoned abstraction in favor of resolutely figurative painting. The practice of drawing became fundamental. After 1968, the painter finally achieved a synthesis of abstract geometry and figuration. His works explore contemporary rituals and the founding myths of the collective imagination. His aim is to suggest what lies hidden in our everyday actions. In a way, he is bringing ancient mythologies into dialogue with those of his own time. Specifically, in "Couple au Jardin des Tuileries" and "Monument sur l'Herbe", he isolates characters emblematic of modern life: couples embracing and kissing become figures of desire and love. For someone who is renowned for his abstraction and his membership of the Abstraction-Création movement, we might have seen this return to the figurative as paradoxical, devoid of meaning or conceptual cohesion. But this is not the case. Hélion went against the wishes of the market, the advice of gallery owners and the expectations of his most loyal collectors. 

The man who was recognized during his lifetime by Eduardo Arroyo and Martial Raysse, a friend of Mondrian and Arp in particular, thus profoundly marked the history of twentieth-century art. His life as a broken line, embodied and committed, contributes to the richness of his monumental work.