Eva Bendien (1921–2000), was a Dutch art collector and art gallery owner.

Biography

She was born in Arnhem as the daughter of an English teacher, and on her mother's side was the niece of the abstract painters

Jacob Bendien Jacob Bendien (1890–1933), was a Dutch painter and graphic artist. Biography He was born in Amsterdam but moved to Paris in 1911 where he met and worked with the sculptor-painter John Rädecker and the painter Jan van Deene. With them he later ...

and

Paul Citroen Roelof Paul Citroen (15 December 1896 – 13 March 1983) was a German-born Dutch artist, art educator and co-founder of the New Art Academy in Amsterdam. Among his best-known works are the photo-montage Metropolis and the 1949 Dutch postage stam ...

. After a short period working as assistant for the director of the Royal Academy in The Hague, a position she obtained through her uncle Citroen, the war broke out. Though her mother was Jewish, her father had become a born-again Christian and her mother did not practise her religion. Thus the first few years of the war were not difficult for her because she didn't wear a yellow star or have a "J" written in her passport. However her family was forced to go underground and Eva spent time at diverse underground addresses in Amsterdam, Bergen, Haarlem, Sneek, Boekelo, and Bornebroek, with the last few months spent in the "Verscholen dorp" a colony of earthen huts housing 86 people in the woods between

Nunspeet Nunspeet () is a municipality and town in the central Netherlands. It has been an agricultural site since prehistoric times. The municipality contains a number of villages, namely Hulshorst, Elspeet, and Vierhouten. Nunspeet has a vivid historica ...

and Vierhouten. Her parents were in a separate block and her father would visit after dark in the evenings to read Shakespeare.article
about Eva Bendien in NRC 15 augustus 1997 Her brother Jaap did not survive the war. After the war she lived in Paris for six months and on her return lived in Amsterdam where she worked for the Rijksmuseum and married the painter Jan Peeters (1912–1992) who was in a group of painters called "The Realists". They had a son. Eva quit her regular job and assisted the art gallery M.L. de Boer on an ''ad hoc'' basis with the set up of exhibitions, while starting to deal in art prints on the side, helped by her uncle Citroen. Her marriage broke up 5 years later and she moved with her son to Heemstede, where her friend Polly Meurs was living with her husband the painter

Jules Chapon Jules Chapon (4 September 1914 – 6 January 2007) was a Dutch artist who moved to France in 1973. Biography Jules was born in Heemstede as the son of Barend Chapon, an Amsterdam stockbroker who was a member of the Heemstede city council as well ...

. Eva got a job in the Asian gallery of W.J.G. van Meurs on the Keizersgracht 578 near the Spiegelstraat but was fired because she needed to leave work early to pick up her son.

Galerie Espace

Together with Polly, Eva started her own gallery of modern art in 1957 called Galerie Espace on the Klein Heiligland 36 in Haarlem. In 1960 they moved the Gallery to Amsterdam near where Eva used to work, on Keizersgracht 548. In 1963 Polly moved to Brussels to start an art gallery there and Eva married Rutger Noordhoek Hegt (1933-2007) who assisted her with and became also director of the gallery in Amsterdam. She died in Amsterdam.

Gallery archive

According to the RKD they have the archives of the gallery that were donated after the death of Eva's husband.Eva Bendien
in the

RKD 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 ...

The archives have letters and receipts for early works by

Anton Heyboer Anton Heyboer (; 9 February 1924 – 9 April 2005) was a Dutch painter and printmaker. Biography According to the informational booklet "Anton Heyboer: Timeless Work", he was born on the small island of Pulau Weh in the north of Sumatra as the ...

, Reinier Lucassen,

Roger Raveel Roger Henri Kamiel, Knight Raveel (15 July 1921 – 30 January 2013) was a Belgian painter, whose work is often associated with pop art because of its depiction of everyday objects. Raveel's style evolved throughout his career, from abstract to ...

Lucebert Lucebert (; Lubertus Jacobus Swaanswijk; 15 September 1924 – 10 May 1994) was a Dutch artist who first became known as the poet of the COBRA movement. He was born in Amsterdam in 1924. He entered the Institute for Arts and Crafts in 193 ...

Wessel Couzijn Wessel may refer to: * Wessel (name), including a list of people with the name * Wessel Islands, a group of islands forming part of the Northern Territory, Australia, named after the Dutch ship ''Wesel'' in 1636 ** Cape Wessel, the most northerly ...

Pierre Alechinsky Pierre Alechinsky (born 19 October 1927) is a Belgian artist. He has lived and worked in France since 1951. His work is related to tachisme, abstract expressionism, and lyrical abstraction. Life Alechinsky was born in Schaerbeek. In 1944 he att ...

Corneille Pierre Corneille (; 6 June 1606 – 1 October 1684) was a French tragedian. He is generally considered one of the three great seventeenth-century French dramatists, along with Molière and Racine. As a young man, he earned the valuable patronag ...

Hugo Claus Hugo Maurice Julien Claus (; 5 April 1929 – 19 March 2008) was a leading Belgian author who published under his own name as well as various pseudonyms. Claus' literary contributions spanned the genres of drama, the novel, and poetry; he also l ...

Klaas Gubbels Klaas Gubbels (born 1934) is a Dutch painter and sculptor with a special love of coffeepots. Biography He was born in Rotterdam and in 1954 he became assistant to Wally Elenbaas and Louis van Roode.Kees Okx, Pearl Perlmutter,

Carel Visser Carel Nicolaas Visser (3 May 1928 – 1 March 2015) was a Dutch sculptor. He is considered an important representative of Dutch abstract-minimalist constructivism in sculpture. Life and work Visser was born on 3 May 1928 in Papendrecht. From 194 ...

and

Karel Appel Christiaan Karel Appel (; 25 April 1921 – 3 May 2006) was a Dutch painter, sculptor, and poet. He started painting at the age of fourteen and studied at the Rijksakademie in Amsterdam in the 1940s. He was one of the founders of the avant-gard ...

.Inventory Galerie Espace
in the RKD

References

External links

Eva Bendien
on

historici.nl The Huygens Institute for the History of the Netherlands was formed on January 1, 2011 through a merger of the Institute of Dutch History ( nl, 'Instituut voor Nederlandse Geschiedenis', ING) a research institute of the Netherlands Organisation f ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bendien, Eva 1921 births 2000 deaths Art collectors from Amsterdam People from Arnhem Dutch art dealers