Charles Hermans (7 August 1839 – 7 December 1924) was a

Belgian Belgian may refer to: * Something of, or related to, Belgium * Belgians, people from Belgium or of Belgian descent * Languages of Belgium, languages spoken in Belgium, such as Dutch, French, and German *Ancient Belgian language, an extinct languag ...

painter Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called the "matrix" or "support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush, but other implements, such as knives, sponges, and ai ...

of genre scenes, portraits, landscapes and some still lifes.Charles Hermans
at the

Netherlands Institute for Art History The Netherlands Institute for Art History or RKD (Dutch: RKD-Nederlands Instituut voor Kunstgeschiedenis), previously Rijksbureau voor Kunsthistorische Documentatie (RKD), is located in The Hague and is home to the largest art history center i ...

Through a number of his monumental genre paintings he played an important role in the recognition of

Realism Realism, Realistic, or Realists may refer to: In the arts *Realism (arts), the general attempt to depict subjects truthfully in different forms of the arts Arts movements related to realism include: *Classical Realism *Literary realism, a move ...

in Belgian art.Denis Laoureux (ed.), ''En nature La Société libre des Beaux-Arts D’Artan à Whistler'', Musée Félicien Rops, 2013, p. 14

Life

Hermans was born in

Brussels Brussels (french: Bruxelles or ; nl, Brussel ), officially the Brussels-Capital Region (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) (french: link=no, Région de Bruxelles-Capitale; nl, link=no, Bruss ...

in a well-off bourgeois family. He showed an interest in art from an early age. In his native city Hermans received some artistic guidance from the painter

Louis Gallait Louis Gallait (9 or 10 May 1810 – 20 November 1887) was a Belgian painter. He lay at the basis of a revival of history painting in Belgium. He earned his reputation especially with the large painting of Charles V's abdication. Gallait's works ...

. He then studied at the Saint Luc workshop in Brussels, a liberal workshop which offered an alternative to traditional academic education. Between 1858 and 1861 he stayed in Paris where he studied at the workshop of the Swiss painter

Charles Gleyre Marc Gabriel Charles Gleyre (2 May 1806 – 5 May 1874), was a Swiss artist who was a resident in France from an early age. He took over the studio of Paul Delaroche in 1843 and taught a number of younger artists who became prominent, including He ...

at the

École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts The Beaux-Arts de Paris is a French ''grande école'' whose primary mission is to provide high-level arts education and training. This is classical and historical School of Fine Arts in France. The art school, which is part of the Paris Science ...

.Lucien Solvay, ''Charles Hermans''
in: Biographie Nationale de Belgique, p. 672-675 Gleyre was a prominent painter who had taken over the studio of

Paul Delaroche Hippolyte-Paul Delaroche (17 July 1797 – 4 November 1856) was a French painter who achieved his greater successes painting historical scenes. He became famous in Europe for his melodramatic depictions that often portrayed subjects from English ...

in 1843 and taught a number of younger artists who became prominent, including

Claude Monet Oscar-Claude Monet (, , ; 14 November 1840 – 5 December 1926) was a French painter and founder of impressionist painting who is seen as a key precursor to modernism, especially in his attempts to paint nature as he perceived it. During ...

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, and

James Abbott McNeill Whistler James Abbott McNeill Whistler (; July 10, 1834July 17, 1903) was an American painter active during the American Gilded Age and based primarily in the United Kingdom. He eschewed sentimentality and moral allusion in painting and was a leading pr ...

. From 1862 to 1867, Hermans stayed in Italy. In Rome he became fascinated with the life of the monks, which became a favorite subject of many paintings between 1866 and 1869. The theme of Catholic clergy was popular at the time as evidenced by the vogue of cardinal paintings made by artists such as the Belgian Georges Croegaert.Joost De Geest, ''500 chefs-d'oeuvre de l'art belge'', Lannoo Uitgeverij, 2006, pp. 215 He had an early success with his paintings of clerics. He later made several trips especially in the Mediterranean region and, in particular, Spain.A. Adriaens-Pannier et al., ''150 ans d’art belge : dans les collections des Musées royaux des beaux-arts de Belgique'', 26 September 1980 – 4 January 1981, Brussels, Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium, 1980, p. 105 Charles Hermans - Circe the temptress

Hermans joined the

Société Libre des Beaux-Arts The Société Libre des Beaux-Arts ("Free Society of Fine Arts") was an organization formed in 1868 by Belgian artists to react against academicism and to advance Realist painting and artistic freedom. Based in Brussels, the society was active un ...

, founded in Brussels on 1 March 1868, which brought together several famous Belgian naturalist artists such as

Charles de Groux Charles de Groux or Charles Degroux (25 August 1825 – 30 March 1870)Charles de Groux
at the

Alfred Verwee Alfred Jacques Verwee (23 April 1838, Saint-Josse-ten-Noode – 15 September 1895, Schaerbeek) was a Belgian painter known for his depictions of animals, landscapes and seascapes. Life His father was the painter Louis-Pierre Verwee and his br ...

Constantin Meunier Constantin Meunier (12 April 1831 – 4 April 1905) was a Belgian painter and sculptor. He made an important contribution to the development of modern art by elevating the image of the industrial worker, docker and miner to an icon of mode ...

, Louis Dubois,

Félicien Rops Félicien Victor Joseph Rops (7 July 1833 – 23 August 1898) was a Belgian artist associated with Symbolism and the Parisian Fin-de Siecle. He was a painter, illustrator, caricaturist and a prolific and innovative print maker, particularly in ...

, Louis Artan de Saint-Martin and

Théodore Baron Théodore Baron (19 August 1840, Ixelles - 4 September 1899, Saint-Servais) was a Belgian landscape painter in the Realistic style. Biography He was initially trained in the Academic style; first by Hippolyte de la Charlerie in Brussels, the ...

. The members admired the work of the French Realist painter

Gustave Courbet Jean Désiré Gustave Courbet ( , , ; 10 June 1819 – 31 December 1877) was a French painter who led the Realism movement in 19th-century French painting. Committed to painting only what he could see, he rejected academic convention and t ...

and wished to confront the prevailing Academism in contemporary Belgian art. The Realist movement in Belgium gradually gained ground as evidenced by the fact that the Realist artists Constantin Meunier and Louis Artan de Saint-Martin received prizes at the Brussels salon of 1869. The battle with the Belgian art establishment appeared to have been won when in 1875 Hermans' ''At dawn'' was accepted at the Brussels salon without opposition. Hermans participated in major international exhibitions such as the art section of the World Fair held in Paris in 1878 where he showed ''At dawn'' to general acclaim. He earned an international reputation thanks to this success. His paintings were acquired by museums, both in Belgium and abroad. Despite this early success Hermans was not able to realise the expectations. He had hoped to reiterate the reception of ''At dawn'' by creating the large, ambitious work ''The masked ball'', which was exhibited at the Paris Salon of 1880. The impact of the work was less than that of his earlier work. Still many reproductions of it were made and the original was acquired by the

Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (PAFA) is a museum and private art school in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.Charles Hermans, ''The masked ball''
at Sotheby's Hermans died in

Menton Menton (; , written ''Menton'' in classical norm or ''Mentan'' in Mistralian norm; it, Mentone ) is a commune in the Alpes-Maritimes department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region on the French Riviera, close to the Italian border. Me ...

on 7 December 1924.

Work

Hermans was a prolific artist who practised many genres throughout his career: history painting, genre art, portraits and landscape painting. He initially painted genre scenes of monks. He subsequently tried to elevate genre painting by treating biblical subjects as genre art. He painted a ''Job visited by his friends'' in which he depicted Job as an ordinary poor man in a Realist style. He then turned to genre scenes such as the ''Honeymoon'' showing a fashionable young couple clearly in love. He later turned to subjects with a social connotation such as the ''Sunday visit to the children's clinic at St. Peter's Hospital''. In this composition he addressed human tragedy and suffering humanity in a moving and honest manner. The sentimentality of the subject assured the success of this composition. Charles Hermans - Monks playing bowls

The crowning achievement of his genre art was the work of 1875 ''At dawn''. It is a realistic and moralizing painting representing an encounter of a group of inebriated revellers leaving a restaurant with prostitutes on their arms in the early hours and a group of poor labourers on their way to work. The work was interpreted as a work of social criticism by contrasting the honest, simple workers with the depraved bourgeoisie. Hermans himself denied that his intention was to engage in social criticism and argued that he chose the subject because of its artistic possibilities.Maurice Sulzberger, ''Guide Illustré de Bruxelles, Tome II, Les musées'', Touring Club de Belgique, 1917, p. 37-38 Charles Hermans - Bath in the garden

Hermans followed up this masterwork with other smaller genre pieces until he attempted another genre scene on a large scale, ''The masked ball''. This work depicts one of the all-night society masked balls of the late 19th century, which were also attended by young women of the ''

demi-monde is French for "half-world". The term derives from a play called , by Alexandre Dumas , published in 1855. The play dealt with the way that prostitution at that time threatened the institution of marriage. The was the world occupied by elite me ...

''. The composition shows a large room filled with groups of partygoers some of whom are in the shadows looking from a balcony in the background while others are active on the crowded dance floor in the front. Elegantly dressed men are joined by many women on the dance floor some in close embrace or animated conversation. Many of the men depicted were prominent personalities of the time. Hermans was able to convey with a remarkable skill the jostling and carnival madness of a night at the theater. Not achieving the expected success with this work, Hermans turned to smaller scale works often depicting charming women, which were based on the studies he had made for the ''Masked ball''. These works are in the same vein as the society portraits of Alfred Stevens. He also painted at the sea from which he returned with fantasies of nude women bathing and Bacchantes. A new high point of this period is the composition ''Circe as temptress'', which shows a seductive woman in a modern interior with a man passed out at a table with an overturned wine glass. This was a return to the veiled social criticism of his earlier work. In his later years he painted large decorative works and landscapes with many figures. During World War I he treated some wartime subjects such as ''The martyrs'' and the ''Execution of Edith Cavell by the Germans''. Hermans' large-format Realist works were influential on the next generation of Belgian artists such as Eugène Laermans and

Léon Frédéric Léon-Henri-Marie Frédéric (26 August 1856 – 27 January 1940) was a Belgian Symbolist painter. His earliest paintings joined Christian mysticism with pantheistic themes, while his later works increasingly reflected social concerns. Much of his ...

Gallery

File:Charles Hermans - The connoisseur.jpg, ''The connoisseur'' File:Charles Hermans - The flower seller.jpeg, ''The flower seller'' File:Charles Hermans - Portrait of a lady.jpg, ''Portrait of a lady'' File:Charles Hermans - The onion sellers.jpeg, ''The onion sellers'' File:Charles Hermans - A secret admirer.jpg, ''A secret admirer'' File:Charles Hermans - Two dancers.jpg, ''Two dancers'' File:Charles Hermans - Sketch for the Masked Ball.jpg, ''Sketch for the Masked Ball''

Notes

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hermans, Charles 1839 births 1924 deaths Artists from Brussels Belgian portrait painters Belgian genre painters Belgian landscape painters 19th-century Belgian painters 19th-century Belgian male artists 20th-century Belgian painters École des Beaux-Arts alumni 20th-century Belgian male artists