Josef Ongenae

Josef Ongenae (1921-1993) was one of the first abstract artists to emerge in postwar Holland and Belgium, working during the crucial years of European artistic reconstruction that followed the devastation of the Second World War. Along with other painters such as André van der Vossen (1893-1963), Ongenae developed a practice in the impersonal, geometric, and objective style reminiscent of the non-representational painting of Dutch masters such as Piet Mondrian and the De Stijl or Neoplasticism movements. His work with color theories and geometric compositions carried forward the great Dutch modernist tradition into the challenging cultural landscape of the postwar era.

Ongenae's experimentations with abstract color and geometric design were shaped directly by the atrocities of the war and its aftermath, which had made the continued pursuit of the Realist styles popular in the 1930s feel inadequate to the changed circumstances of European life. An alternative was needed, and abstraction, which had been condemned by the Nazis as "degenerate art," appeared as a suitable path forward as well as a way to re-establish the foundation for a more hopeful society. Turning to non-representational forms became for Ongenae and his colleagues both an artistic and a moral choice, one that placed their practice at the heart of the reconstruction of European culture.

Willem Sandberg, then the director of the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, staged a series of important exhibitions featuring the work of abstract artists including Ongenae, van der Vossen, Hans Ittmann (1914-1972), and Willy Boers (1905-1978). These exhibitions helped bring the new abstract style to public attention and led to the eventual maturation of postwar Dutch and Belgian abstraction as a significant international movement. Sandberg's advocacy proved decisive at a moment when institutional support for such radical work was still uncertain.

These works initially scandalized both the public and the press, although these reactions would soon be tempered into broader acceptance as postwar audiences gradually adjusted to the new visual language. Today Ongenae's paintings are appreciated as important contributions to the emergence of postwar European abstraction and can be found in significant Dutch and Belgian collections.