Eric Massholder was born on December 12, 1960 in Heildelberg, southwest Germany. He comes into contact with the so-called “atelier” painting, very young, somehow by chance, while his girlfriend at the time was doing an internship in a gallery. As he states, this is where he learnt “the alchemy of painting”. As an autodidact, his work has been greatly influenced by his travels in his youth through Morocco, Sicily, Greece, Turkey and the three months spent in India. He first arrived in France for a sojourn at his maternal grandmother who owned a house on the Côte d’Azur. Massholder permanently moved to France in 1981. He studied at the prestigious Villa Arson in Nice between 1981 and 1982. Later, he spent two years between 1987 and 1989 working in Paris for the art dealer Frédéric Nocera, who commissioned him works and provided him with a studio and a home in Vaugirard. He also worked afterwards for Anne Lettrée in Paris only to return in the end again to the South of France. Massholder was born into an artistic family. His brother, Frank Massholder works in the cinema and has a gallery in Berlin. Eric Massholder’s uncle is the late renowned film director and screenwriter Jean-Louis Bertucelli who shot films with Jean-Louis Trintignant, Michel Piccoli, Annie Girardot, Jean-Pierre Cassel or Isabelle Huppert. His film “Ramparts of Clay” was selected as the French entry for Best Foreign Language Film at the 44th Academy Awards. Massholder’s cousin is the film director Julie Bertucelli, that has shot with Charlotte Gainsbourg, Chiara Mastroianni and Catherine Deneuve.

Massholder is deeply inspired by the artists of the turn of the last century and the great painters like van Gogh, Picasso or Dalí and his artworks aim to establish a link between these artists. As he says in his own words: “I kindly wanted to give Dali’s hand to Picasso. This wish is the strength of my work.” Being of a Franco-German and Italian descent, he believs that he had taken his expressionist side from his German father, his impressionist side of his French mother, and his love for the Renaissance from his Florentine grand-father. Massholder excels in painting, sculpture, drawing and printing techniques. In his work he mixes painting styles, from primitivism to surrealism. He creates an unknown, strange and fascinating universe that he constantly reinvents with the use of multiple colors and techniques such as oil, pastel and ink. There are recurring themes and patterns and he adds symbolic and allegorical signs that include the triangle, the sun, the moon, the fish, the peacock, the pyramid or the sphinx. In his works, Eric Massholder condenses his desires, his fears and his dreams in collections of very intense motifs. For this, he repeatedly uses the same language and expression – for example, life and death can be found in the form of eggs or skulls in his paintings. He builds an iconographic vocabulary on the whereabouts of society; his images are almost like proverbs – his shark, assimilates the voracity of the business world to the sexual power. His dollar-monster denounces the world of the international finance carrying death.

Massholder worked during his life on several series, which make reference to historical personalities, places of worship or major literary texts. These series include the series of illustrations on the letters addressed by Vincent van Gogh to his brother Théo, the one on Garibaldi but also the one on Monte Verità or on the Divine Comedy of Dante, the Iliad and the Odyssey of Homer, as well as the tale of The Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily by Goethe.

Today his work has been the object of exhibitions in a number of galleries all around Europe including Heidelberg, Berlin, Frankfurt, Munich, Nuremberg, Brussels, Gent, Lausanne, Venice, Paris, Strasbourg, Nice and Monaco. In 1997, he won the Special Prize of the Jury from the Arts Festival in Montreux. The luxurious limited edition of the illustrations of the letters of van Gogh is part of the archives of museums such as the MAMAC in Nice or the Georges Pompidou Center in Paris.

For him, art is the process of life that alone can help open the eyes for better fulfillment. He is not a calm artist. Perpetually under pressure, he thinks that he will never have enough time to express everything he wants to say, but he is probably wrong because his power and ease of work help him make his way.
Jean-Paul Aureglia, Galérie Quadrige

1986 – Galerie Krivy, Nice, France
1987 – Heidelberg, Allemagne
1987 – Galerie Archetype, Nice, France
1987 – Art Nurnberg 3, Nurnberg, Allemagne
1988 – Maison Jacques Brel, Bruxelles, Belgique
1989 – HS Galerie, Heidelberg, Allemagne
1989 – SAGA, Paris, France
1991 – Festival des Arts, Beaulieu-sur-Mer, France
1991 – Sole Tuna Artfair, Stockholm, Suède
1992 – Galerie Nocera-Hanin, Paris, France
1992 – Quernheim Fine Arts, Monaco
1993 – Comité International d’Art Plastique de Paris, Paris, France
1995 – Landestheater Memmingen, Memmingen, Allemagne
1995 – 1er Salon International d’Art Contemporain de Strasbourg, Strasbourg, France
1996 – Kunsträume St. Georgsburg, Hamburg, Allemagne
1997 – Lineart – Foire Internationale, Gent, Belgique
1998 – ART Lausanne, Lausanne, Suisse
1998 – (Mars – Avril) Galerie Quadrige, Centre du Palais, Nice, France
1999 – (Mars) Galerie Percosi d’Arte, Venise, Italie
En permanence – Riccardo Guarneri, Giancarlo Franco Tramontini, Emanuela Ferrazzoni, Pavel Hogel, David Marinotto, Petr Zlamal, Marek Trizuliak, Neno Franco Varrone, Paolo Frascati, Riccardo Lucchini, Marcolino Gandini, Luciano Massari, Petr Kuba, Friedrich Danielis
1999 – START, Strasbourg, France
1999 – (Novembre – Décembre) Galerie Quadrige, Nice, France
Didier Gasc, Miljan Tihojevic, Monasterio, Toos van Holstein, Pablo Atchugarry, Antonio Biancalani, Giuliano Ottaviani, Marc Fonvieille, Sandrine Delrieu, Francis Gimgembre, Lluis Penaranda, Emanuela Ferrazzoni, Eric Massholder
1999 – (Novembre – Décembre) – Massholder-Valdorf, Peintures Design Architecture
Galerie l’art contemporain Palais de l’Europe, Menton, France
2000 – Salon International du Livre au Festival d’Art, Monte Carlo, Monaco
2000 – Galerie Quadrige, Nice, France
2001 – Prix Scpecial du Jury au Festival d’Art à Montreux, Montreux, Suisse
2001 – (Mars) Le CERAM Sophie Antipolis, Sophia Antipolis, France
2001 – (Avril – Mai) Galerie Quadrige, Centre du Palais, Nice, France
Paolo Frascati, David Marinotto, Eric Massholder, Toos van Holstein, Toshinori Nakaya, Uno Svensson
2001 – (Mai – Juin) Croix Rouge Russe A.O, Nice, France
2003 – (Janvier – Février) Galerie Quadrige, Nice, France
2004 – (Septembre – Octobre) Chapelle Saint Jean-Baptiste, Saint-Jeannet, France
2005 – Galerie du Parc, Braunschweig, Allemagne
2005 – (Novembre) Galerie Schloss Heidelberg, Allemagne
2005 – (Novembre) Art moderne japonais à Heidelberg
Galerie Signum, Heidelberg, Allemagne
2006 – Triennale de Chamalieres, Chamalieres, France
2006 – Galerie Signum, Heidelberg, Allemagne
2006 – (Septembre – Novembre) – Eric Massholder, Galerie Quadrige, Nice, France
2007 – (Février) – Aus der tiefe des seele, Thomas Dehler Haus, Berlin, Allemagne
2007 – (Mars – Mai) – Spacepologie, Galerie Planet Vivid, Frankfurt, Allemagne
2007 – (Novembre – Janvier) – Le conte du serpent vert de Goethe
Galerie Quadrige, Nice, France
2007 – (Novembre – Janvier) – Galerie Quadrige, Nice, France
2008 – (Mars – Mai) Galerie Planet Vivid, Frankfurt, Allemagne
2009 – (Octobre – Novembre) – Illustrer (Mode…fication) de Raphael Monticelli
Galerie Quadrige, Nice, France
2009 – Musée Goya, Castres, France
2010 – (Février-Avril) – Eric Massholder Peinture, Rein-Mein Museum, Mannheim, Allemagne
2010 – Kunstverein Mannheim, Mannheim, Allemagne
2010 – La mode et la mort, Kamil Art Gallery, Monaco
2010 – (Juin) Laboratorio delle Arti Associazioni Culturale, Plaisance, Italie
2010 – 4th International Biennale for the Artist’s book
Bibliotheca Alexandrina, Alexandria, Egypte
2011 – (Septembre – Octobre) – Afternativelight (Passions cachées…“Jardins secrets“), en exclusivite les dessins de Robert Redford, Cap d’Ail, France et Monaco
2012 – Galerie Quadrige, Nice, France
2012 – Maîtres Catalans, Wiesbaden, Allemagne
2012 – (Décembre – Janvier) Die Galerie, Weinheim, Allemagne
2012 – (Décembre) – Père puissant et son fils, Artloftandmore, Dossenheim, Allemagne
2012 – Weg zur Kunst, Bad Soden am Taunus, Allemagne
2013 – Ventes aux enchères sous le haut patronnage de s.a.s. la princess Stephanie, Monaco
2013 – (Octobre – Janvier) – Mythos Mensch, Artloftandmore, Dossenheim, Allemagne
2014 – Galerie Quadrige, Nice, France
2015 – (Mars – Mai) – Monte Verita, Galerie Z22, Berlin, Allemagne
2015 – (Mars – Juin) – Monte Verita, Artloftandmore, Dossenheim, Allemagne
2015 – (Juin – Juillet) Galerie Quadrige, Nice, France
Michèle Brondello, Paso, Giovanni Rubino, Guy Divetain, Eric Massholder, Remo Giatti, Henri Maccheroni, Carmen Boccu
2015 – ARTatBerlin, Berlin, Allemagne
2015 – (Novembre – Juillet) – Femme aux lunettes, Artloftandmore, Dossenheim, Allemagne
2015 – Artloftandmore, Galerie Z22, Berlin, Allemagne
2015 – (Novembre – Janvier) – Hommage à Vincent van Gogh
Artloftandmore, Berlin, Allemagne
2015 – Galerie Quadrige, Nice, France
2016 – Galerie Quadrige, Nice, France
2016 – (Février – Mars) – Odyssée, Quadrige, Nice, France
2016 – M&M-project, Artloftandmore, Berlin, Allemagne
2016 – 7th International Biennale for the Artist’s book
Bibliotheca Alexandrina, Alexandria, Egypte
2016 – Galerie Z22, Berlin, Allemagne
2016 – (Avril – Mai) – Femme aux lunettes, Kamil Art Gallery, Monaco
2016 – (Mai – Juillet) – Femme aux lunettes, Artloftandmore, Berlin, Allemagne
2016 – Galerie Quadrige, Nice, France
2016 – (Juin – Septembre) – 70 ans UMAM, 1946 – 2016, UMAM, Menton, France
2017 – Galerie Art Kamil, Monaco
2017 – (Janvier – Février) – Human Robot, Eric Massholder, Taymour Benkhalef
Galerie Z22, Berlin, Allemagne
2017 – (Juin – Juillet) Galerie Quadrige, Nice, France
2017 – Galerie Z22, Berlin, Allemagne
2017 – (Juin-Juillet) – Sex Sells 13 Positions, Galerie Z22, Berlin, Allemagne
Hardy Brackmann, Oliver Ferch, Vlada Hauser, Mathias Hornung, Henri Maccheroni,
Eric Massholder, Frank Massholder, M+M, M&M project, Benjamin Reich, Mariella
RIdda, Kai Teichert, Kurt Woldmann
2017 – (Novembre – Décembre) – Tête à tête, Massholder, Fischer, Lee
Galerie Z22, Berlin, Allemagne
2017 – Expositive, Fight Aids Monaco, Kamil Art Gallery, Monaco
2017 – (Novembre-Décembre) – Le penseur, Artloftandmore, Berlin, Allemagne
2018 – Popolation, Galerie Z22, Berlin, Allemagne
2019 – (Mars – Avril) – Monte Verita, Galerie Quadrige, Nice, France