general, led to the formation at Brussels of an association under
the name of the Free Society of Fine Arts. This group of painters
had a marked influence on the development of the school, and
hand in hand with the pupils of Portaels—a teacher of sober
methods, caring more for sound practice than for theories it
encouraged not merely the expression of deep and domestic
feeling which we find in the works of Leys and de Groux, but
also the endeavour to paint nature in the broad light of open air.
The example of the Free Society found imitators; various artistic
groups were formed to organize exhibitions where new works
could be seen and studied irrespective of the influence of dealers,
or of the conservatism of the authorities which was increasingly
conspicuous in the official galleries; till what had at first been
regarded as a mere audacious and fantastic demonstration
assumed the dignity of respectable effort. The “Cercle des
Vingt” (“The Twenty Club”) also exerted a marked influence.
By introducing into its exhibitions works by the greatest foreign
artists it released Belgian art from the uniformity which some
too patriotic theorists would fain have imposed. The famous
“principle of individuality in art” was asserted there in a really
remarkable manner, for side by side with the experiments of
painters bent on producing certain effects of light hung the
works of men who clung to literary or abstract subjects. Other
groups, again, were formed on the same lines; but then came
the inevitable reaction from these elaborations of quivering
light and subtle expression, pushed, as it seemed, to an extreme.
The youngest generation of Brussels painters, in revolt against
the lights and ultra-refinements of their immediate predecessors,
seem to take pleasure in a return to gums and bitumen, and to
seek the violent effects so dear to the romantic painters of a
past time.
Brussels is the real centre of art in Belgium. Antwerp, the home of Rubens, is resting on the memory of past glories, after vainly trying to uphold the ideal formerly held in honour by Flemish painters. And yet, so great is the prestige of this ancient reputation, that Antwerp even now attracts artists from every land, and more especially the dealers who go thither to buy pictures as a common form of merchandise. At Ghent the wonderful energy of the authorities who get up the triennial exhibitions makes these the most interesting provincial shows of their kind; other towns, as Liége, Tournay, Namur, Mons and Spa also have periodical exhibitions.
From 1830, in the early days of the Belgian school of painting, we may observe a tendency to seek for the fullest qualities of colour, with delicate gradations of light and shade. In this Wappers led the way. At a time when his teachers in the Antwerp Academy would recognize nothing but the heavy brown tones of old paintings, he was already representing the transparent shadows of natural daylight. But heroic and sentimental romanticism was already making way for the serious expression of domestic and popular feeling, and thenceforward the prominence assumed by genre, and yet more by landscape, led to a deeper and more direct study of the various aspects of nature. At the same time a special sense of colour was the leading characteristic of the artists of the time, and it was truly said that “the ambition to be a fine painter was stronger than the desire for scrupulous exactitude.” Artists evidently aimed, in the first place, at a solid impasto and glowing colour; an undertone, ruddy and golden, gleamed through the paler and more real hues of the over-painting. In this way we may certainly recognize the influence of the French colourists of Courbet’s time; just as we may trace the influence of the grey tone prevalent in Manet’s day in the effort to paint with more simple truth and fewer tricks of recipe, which became evident when the “Free Society” was founded at Brussels, and the pupils from Portaels’s studio came to the front.
Among the artists who were then working the following must be named (with their best works in the Brussels Gallery): Alfred Stevens (q.v.), an incomparably charming painter, characterized by exquisite harmony of colour and marvellous dexterity with the brush. In the Brussels Gallery are his “The Lady in Pink,” “The Studio,” “The Widow,” “A Painter and his Model,” and “The Lady-Bird.” Joseph Stevens, his brother, a master-painter of dogs, broad in his draughtsmanship, and painting in strong touches of colour, is represented by “The Dog-Market,” “Brussels—Morning,” “A Dog before a Mirror”; Henri de Braekeleer, the nephew and pupil of Leys, a fine painter of interiors, in warm and golden tones, by “The Geographer,” “A Farm—Interior,” “A Shop”; Lievin de Winne, a portrait painter, sober in style and refined in execution, by “Leopold I., King of the Belgians”; Florent Willems, archaic and elegant, by “The Wedding Dress”; Eugêne Smits, a refined colourist, always working with the thought of Venice in his mind, by “The Procession of the Seasons”; Louis Dubois, a powerful colourist with a full brush, striving to resemble Courbet, by “Storks,” “Fish” Alfred Verwée, a fine animal painter, with special love for a sheeny silkiness of texture, by “The Estuary of the Scheldt,” “The Fair Land of Flanders,” “A Zeeland Team”; Alfred Verhaeren, a pupil of L. Dubois, by some “Interiors”; Felicien Rops, an extraordinary artist, precise in drawing, sensual and incisive, by “A Parisienne”; Félix ter Linden, a restless, refined nature, always trying new subtleties of the brush and palette-knife, by “Captives.” Amongst other painters may be named Camille van Camp, Gustave de Jonghe, Franz Verhas, and his brother Jan Verhas, the painter of the popular “School Feast” in the Brussels Gallery; and Jan van Beers, the clever painter of female coquettishness, represented by pictures in the Antwerp Gallery.
As landscape painters, the chief are: Hippolyte Boulenger, a refined draughtsman and a delicate colourist, represented in the Brussels Gallery by “View of Dinant,” “The Avenue of Old Hornbeams at Tervueren,” “The Meuse at Hastifere”; Alfred de Knyff, noble and elegant, by “The Marl Pit,” “A Heath—Campine”; Joseph Coosemans, by “A Marsh—Campine”; Jules Montigny, by “Wet Weather”; Alph. Asselbergs, by “A Marsh—Campine.” There are also Xavier and César de Cock, painters in light gay tones of colour; Gustave Den Duyts, a lover of melancholy twilight, represented in the same gallery by “A Winter Evening”; Mme Marie Collart, a seeker after the more melancholy and concentrated impressions of nature, by “The Old Orchard”; and Baron Jules Gœthals.
Of the Antwerp school, François Lamorinière, archaic and minute, has in the Brussels Gallery his “View from Edeghem,” and there is also Théodore Verstraete, sentimental, or frenzied.
As marine painters: Paul Jean Clays, who delights in vivid effects of colour, is represented at Brussels by “The Antwerp Roadstead,” “Calm on the Scheldt”; Louis Artan, who prefers dark and powerful effects, by “The North Sea,” besides Robert Mols, A. Bouvier, and Lemayeur.
As painters of town scenery may be named F. Stroobant, a draughtsman rather than a painter, who is represented in the Brussels Gallery by “The Grande Place at Brussels,” and J. B. Van More, a colourist chiefly, by “The Cathedral at Belem.”
The flower painter, Jean Robie, has in the Brussels Gallery “Flowers and Fruit.”
Jean Portaels, the painter of “A Box at the Theatre,” at Budapest, is represented in the Brussels Gallery by “The Daughter of Sion Insulted”; Émile Wauters, a master of free and solid brushwork, equally skilled in portraiture, historical composition and decorative portrait painting, by “The Madness of Hugo van der Goes”; Edouard Agneessens, a genuine painter, with breadth of vision and facile execution, by portraits; André Hennebicq, a painter of historical subjects, by “Labourers in the Campagna, Rome”; Isidore Verheyden, a landscapist and portrait painter, by “Woodcutters”; Eugène Verdyen and Émile Charlet should be mentioned, and the landscape painter Henri van der Hecht, whose “On the Sandhills” is in the Brussels Gallery.
The principal landscape painters of what is known as the “neutral tint” school (l’École du gris) are: Théodore Baron, faithful to the sterner features of Belgian scenery, represented in the Brussels Gallery by “A Winter Scene—Condroz”; Adrien Joseph Heymans, a careful student of singular effects of light, by “Springtime”; Jacques Rosseels, a painter of the cheerful brightness of the Flemish country, by “A Heath,” besides Isidore Meyers and Florent Crabeels.
Some figure painters who may be added to this group are: Charles Hermans, whose picture “Dawn” (Brussels Gallery), exhibited in 1875, betrays the ascendancy of the principles upheld by the Free Society of Fine Arts; Jean de la Hoese, who has since made portraits his special line; Émile Sacré; Léon Philippet, represented in the Brussels Gallery by “The Murdered Man”; and Jan Stobbaerts, a masterly painter, powerful but coarse, by “A Farm—Interior.”
Three more artists were destined to greater fame: Constantin Meunier, a highly respected artist, equally a painter and a sculptor, known as the Millet of the Flemish workman, who has depicted with noble feeling his admiration and pity for one contemporary state of the human race, and who is represented in the Brussels Gallery by “The Peasants’ War”; Xavier Mellery, who tries to express in works of high artistic merit the inner life of men and things, and personifications of thought, by “A Drawing”; and Alexandre Struys, a strong and clever painter, expressing his sympathy with poverty and misfortune in works of remarkable ability.
Besides these, Charles Verlat, a powerful and skilled artist, painted a vast variety of subjects; his teaching was influential in the Antwerp Academy. In the Brussels Gallery he is represented by “Godfrey de Bouillon at the Siege of Jerusalem,” “A Flock of Sheep attacked by an Eagle”; Alfred Cluysenaar, whose aim is to produce decorative work on an enormous scale, by “Canossa”; Albrecht de Vriendt, by “Homage done to Charles V. as a Child”; Juliaan de Vriendt, by “A Christmas Carol”; Victor Lagye, by
