Les Errantes

Abdallah Benanteur was born in Mostaganem, Algeria, in 1931. He was brought up in close contact with Algerian music and lute players, which seem to have echoed in his head all throughout his artistic career, as his paintings always have a rich lyrical tone to them. When he was an adolescent, Benanteur met the late Mohammed Khadda (1930-1991), a painter and writer, who became one of his very close friends. They both shared a passion for the poetic illuminations of Al-Hallaj, Ibn Arabi, Omar Khayyam and Saadi, as well as for the French painter Paul Cézanne's visual and constructive order, whose influence they discovered in books of reproductions. Although Benanteur attended classes at the Académie de la Grande-Chaumière in Paris, having settled in the French capital in 1953, the most rewarding and fruitful learning was achieved through his multiple visits to the Musée du Louvre, where he admired the vast collection of Old Master Paintings. He later discovered many other major museums' treasures throughout his journeys to Italy, Spain, the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany.