Egide François Leemans or Egide Leemans (
Antwerp
Antwerp (; nl, Antwerpen ; french: Anvers ; es, Amberes) is the largest city in Belgium by area at and the capital of Antwerp Province in the Flemish Region. With a population of 520,504, , 28 April 1839 – Antwerp, 2 January 1883) was a
Belgian
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* Something of, or related to, Belgium
* Belgians, people from Belgium or of Belgian descent
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painter, draughtsman and engraver.
[LEEMANS, Egide François (1839 - 1883), Engraver]
in: Benezit Dictionary of Artists He is best known for his paintings and prints of waterscapes, harbours and seascapes in the evening or at night. His work represents a break with the tradition of grand themes in Belgian marine art in favour of a realist representation of nature.
[Pol de Mont, 'De schilderkunst in België van 1830 tot 1921', The Hague, Martinus Nijhoff, p. 160-161, 165-168 ]
Life and work
Leemans studied at the
Academy of Fine Arts of Antwerp. The teachers and pupils of the Antwerp Academy with an interest in marine painting worked in the Romantic tradition:
Jacob Jacobs depicted stormy scenes and
Hendrik Frans Schaefels preferred scenes of historic naval engagements.
[ Leemans broke with this Romantic and historical approach to marine art in favour of a more realistic rendering of nature even in its modest appearance.
Leemans painted his marine landscapes from nature although he may have finalised his works in the studio.][ His most frequent subjects are landscapes of rivers or canals with sailing boats in old cities in Flanders and The Netherlands. He had a preference for showing the reflection of the moonlight on river landscapes.][Egide François Leemans]
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 ...
Most of his works have a silvery gray undertone. As his style of marine art did not follow the contemporary Romantic, grandiose vision of Belgian marine art, his works did not sell well and he died in relative poverty.[
A few still lifes by Leemans depicting flowers and fruit typically set in a landscape are also recorded.Attributed to Egide François Leemans (Belgian, 1839–1883), 'Floral still life in urn in a landscape']
at Artnet
Gallery
File:Egide François Leemans - Summer evening.jpg, Summer evening
File:Egide François Leemans - Canal in Dordrecht at moonlight.jpg, Canal in Dordrecht at moonlight
File:Egide François Leemans - Seascape.jpg, Seascape
References
Further reading
* Hostyn, Norbert, ‘De zee en de kunst : Frans Hens en Egidius-Frans Leemans. - Met 3 afb. Frans Hens ''De Schelde'', ''De overzetboot naar St. Anna'' (1885), ''Boot op de Schelde''’, in: Neptunus, December 1985, number 2, p. 5-8
External links
Belgian marine painters
Belgian printmakers
Painters from Antwerp
19th-century Belgian painters
Belgian male painters
19th-century Belgian male artists
1839 births
1883 deaths
{{Belgium-artist-stub