Henri Goetz

Henri Goetz (New York, 1909 – Nice, 1989) was a painter and printmaker of American birth who spent most of his career in Paris, where he became part of the Surrealist circle. He matters for his paintings and, above all, for inventing the carborundum printmaking technique, which printmakers around the world have since adopted.

After studying electrical engineering and art in the United States, he settled in Paris in 1930 and attended several academies and Montparnasse studios, including that of Amédée Ozenfant. His first solo exhibition took place in 1937 at the Galerie Bonaparte, alongside his wife, the painter Christine Boumeester. During the Occupation he joined the French Resistance, mainly forging identity documents. After the war he worked in radio and taught for years at several Parisian academies.

In the 1960s he invented carborundum printing, and in 1968 the Maeght Gallery published a treatise on the method, prefaced by Joan Miró. Goetz left a printing technique that other artists, including Antoni Tàpies and Miró himself, used in their work.