(b Ostend, 28 July 1881; d Brussels, 23 Nov 1946).
Belgian painter and designer. His initial sources of inspiration
were the bottles and flasks he saw in his father’s perfumery shop in Ostend. However, in 1889 he studied briefly at the Terenacademie in
Bruges. His early work, already impregnated with Symbolism, was fed
by his readings of Friedrich Nietzsche and Maurice Maeterlinck, for
example. From February 1903 to January 1904 he worked for Edmond
Deman, the Brussels publisher associated particularly with Emile
Verhaeren, who encouraged him. In 1904 Spilliaert stayed in Paris,
where he was on the fringe of Picasso’s circle and discovered the
work of Munch and Toulouse-Lautrec, whose influences he
acknowledged. He continued to spend most winters in Paris to keep in
touch with the city’s cultural life. A stomach ulcer that gave him
insomnia turned him into a nocturnal stroller, which gave rise to
innumerable works in a mixture of watercolour, pastel, coloured
pencil and Chinese ink. They revealed the beauties of Ostend by
night: deserted dykes and quays, arcades, street-lamps shining
through fog and mist. Ditch and Casino at Ostend (1908;
Brussels, priv. col.) prefigures de Chirico. Between 1907 and 1913
he developed an original form of Symbolism, tinged with
Expressionism and governed by a strict sense of synthesis.
He painted numerous self-portraits, works steeped in mystery and melancholy
(e.g. Woman in the Train, 1908; Brussels, Mus. A. Mod.) and
those inspired by the contrast between a solitary figure and the
vastness of the sea or sky (e.g. Woman Bather, 1910;
Brussels, Mus. A. Mod.). He also created geometric landscapes that
verged on abstraction and were unique for the period (e.g. Woman
on the Dyke, 1908; Brussels, Mus. A. Mod.). At the same time he
was developing Art Nouveau motifs as in Pietà (1910;
Brussels, Mus. Ixelles), where whiplash arabesques animate the
waves. From 1912 he executed large-scale pastels (900*700 mm) of
various harbour scenes, with large schematized figures that
influenced Constant Permeke (e.g. Fisherman’s Wife,
1912). He moved in literary and cultural circles and
was a friend of the Belgian playwright Fernand Crommelynck, as well
as of Stefan Zweig who had followed his career from its beginnings. |
