Belgium, where he was born, gave Henry W.WESTEL's eyes the transparent blue of its sky.

     Graduated from the Ecole Boulle , he spends a short period in the Beaux-Arts and Art Décoratifs schools and meet all the people who will mark the late XXth century's art. Noticed by Jacques VILLON for the rigour of his drawing, his talent blooms under the firm rule of such a master.

     A protean man, WESTEL becomes the artistical director of various publishers and learns all about the publishing industry, from typography to illustration, thus rediscovering the craftman's pride before a nice piece of work, inheritage of his prior formation.

     A secret painter, more a creator than an illustrator in the ethymological meaning of the word, WESTEL makes the unspoken emerge from the works on wich he collaborates. Thus involved in Verlaine's 'Fêtes Galantes', he accompanies Rimbaud, ' the man with windy soles' along his 'Illuminations' and succeeds in letting us hear Vercors' 'Silence de la mer' ('The silence of sea'). His interpretation of Scarron's 'Roman Comique' in the set of the 'Grands Classiques' published by the Imprimerie Nationale puts him among the most outstanding painters of this collection.

     In the Editions Carrés d'Art, Henry W.WESTEL illustrated 'The Prince' by Machiavelli with original lithographs.

     His works appear in many private collections.