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Obit
Michel Tombelaine loved life with the most open heart. He was a devoted husband, father, grandfather, uncle, cousin, and friend to many. Born in Paris, he worked as a journalist for Le Monde; immigrated to the US in his 20’s and was chief of the French Press Service at the UN. He created a news service for developing nations, reported for French and Canadian radio and owned a newspaper. A later career as an artist, with an MFA from the New School, focused on abstract expressionism and most recently portraiture. His solo exhibition at Prince Street Gallery (New York City, October 2016) was a great success. Tombelaine’s ebullience for living leaves a legacy of beauty and kindness.
Bio
Michel Tombelaine’s last exhibition at Prince Street Gallery was in October 2016. The show featured a transition from an “expressionist’s concentration on paint and gesture” to work in portraiture. Of the work, Tombelaine stated at the time, “In landscapes and still life I focus on planes and rhythm. In portraits, I try to express in few lines the inner life of the bearer.”An observer of his portraits stated, “They are an invitation not a demonstration, to view the person’s inner spirit”.
Michel Tombelaine was an artist who lives in New York City. He received early art training in his native French Ecole du Louvre in Paris. Tombelaine came to NYC at the height of the abstract expressionist movement.
He studied with Nicholas Carone at the Studio School for drawing, painting and sculpture; and then in Italy at the International School of Painting in Todi, Umbria. He earned his MFA from the New School in NYC and also studied at the National Academy School of Fine Arts.
Tombelaine is in several collections in France and the US. He has shown in galleries in NY, CT and Washington DC. He was awarded the A Baldwin Prize for Watercolor from the National Academy School of Fine arts in NYC.