Charles Kvapil

Charles Kvapil, Antwerp 1884 – 1957 Paris, 'Interieur au Bord de la Mer'

1884 – 1957

Jean François Portaels 1818 - Brussels - 1895 Belgian Painter ‘Oriental Girls - Mediants à Tanger, Maroc’ Signature: signed lower right ‘J. Portaels’ Medium: oil on canvas Dimensions: image size 40,5 x 28,5 cm, frame size 67,5 x 56 cm Biography: Jean François Portaels, also known as Jan Portaels, was a versatile Belgian painter born on April 3, 1818, in Vilvoorde and passed away on February 8, 1895, in Schaerbeek. He was celebrated for his genre scenes, biblical stories, landscapes, portraits, and Orientalist subjects. As a teacher and director of the Academy of Fine Arts of Ghent and the Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts in Brussels, Portaels significantly impacted Belgian art, becoming a pivotal figure in the Belgian Orientalist school. His works were known for their 'everyday elegance and feminine grace,' and he played a crucial role in influencing the next generation of Belgian artists, including notable figures like Théo van Rysselberghe. Portaels was the son of a wealthy brewer who also served as Vilvoorde's mayor. Showing an early passion for drawing, he was sent to the Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts in Brussels in 1836, where he studied under François-Joseph Navez, a former student of Jacques-Louis David. Navez invited him to his studio, which was renowned at the time, allowing Portaels to refine his skills alongside other talented students like Charles de Groux and Joseph Stallaert. In 1841, Portaels moved to Paris, enrolling at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts and studying under Paul Delaroche. He became influenced by the emerging Orientalist movement, which was gaining traction in Paris. In 1842, he won the Grand Prix de Rome, which funded his travels across Italy and other regions, including Morocco, Algeria, Egypt, Lebanon, Judea, Spain, Hungary, and Norway. These journeys profoundly influenced his artistic vision, particularly his Orientalist works. Upon his return to Belgium in 1847, Portaels was appointed Director of the academy in Ghent. In 1849, he married Marie Hélène Navez, the daughter of his first teacher. Despite being offered the directorship of the Brussels Academy, he initially declined, opting to preserve his independence. He later accepted a teaching position at the Academy and eventually became its director in 1878, succeeding Eugène Simonis. Portaels was known for his broad range of artistic talents, including history painting, portraiture, and genre art. He was particularly recognised for his Orientalist depictions, often portraying the 'Oriental woman' with distinctive features like arched eyebrows and almond-shaped eyes. His style, marked by charm and elegance, distinguished him from the dominant artistic movements of Classicism and Romanticism. He was a pioneer in monumental art in Belgium, working with Jean Baptiste van Eycken to introduce fresco techniques like water glass painting...

A Royal Greenhouse Interior, Brussels Marcotte Marie-Antoinette Troyes 1869 – 1929 Paris French School Signature: Signed bottom left Dimensions: Image size 101 x 80,50 cm, frame size 103,50 x 93,50 cm Medium: Oil on canvas Biography: Marcotte Marie-Antoinette was a French luminist and impressionist painter and a watercolourist of genre scenes, landscapes, still-life, gardens and flowers. Born in Troyes, France on May 31 in 1869. Settled in a very young age with her family and raised in Antwerp. Follows in the age of nineteen several months lessons in the studio of the famed Jules Joseph Lefèbvre in Paris. Further education at the Academy Royale des Beaux-Art of Brussels (1889 -1891) pupil of Jean François Portaels and Emile Claus...

A Garden with Tulips Daens Antoine Brussels 1871 – 1946 Belgian Painter Signature: Signed bottom left and dated 1936 Dimensions: Image size 53 x 69 cm, frame size 61 x 77 cm Medium...

Toussaint Fernand Brussels 1873 – 1956 Belgian Painter Portrait of a Lady Signature: Signed bottom left Medium: Oil on canvas Dimensions: Image size 46 x 38 cm, frame size 64 x 56 c...

Harry Leslie Hoffman (1871 - 1964) The Artist's Wife (Beatrice Pope) at the Loom, circa 1915 Oil on canvas 30 x 32 inches Housed in a period Newcomb-Macklin frame Provenance: Estate of the artist Private Collection, Massachusetts This painting depicts the artist's wife at the loom, producing textile versions of Hoffman's underwater paintings. The screen shown behind Bea is an underwater scene also painted by Hoffman. The study of this painting is held in the collection of the Wolfsonian Museum in Florida. Harry Leslie Hoffman was born in Cressona, a small community in Pennsylvania's Schuylkill Valley. His mother was an amateur artist who encouraged her son to pursue a career in the arts. In 1893, Hoffman entered the School of Art at Yale University and studied with John Ferguson Weir, the son of Robert Walter Weir. After graduation in 1897, Hoffman moved to New York to continue his studies at the Art Students League. He also traveled to Paris and took classes at the Académie Julien. In the summer of 1902, Hoffman attended the Lyme Summer School of Art, in the town of Old Lyme on the Connecticut coast. The school was headed by Frank Vincent Dumond and was located in a boarding house owned by Florence Griswold. The school eventually grew into an artists' colony and a center for American Impressionism. When Hoffman first arrived as a student, he was not permitted to stay in the house which was designated for the professional artists only. However, his outgoing personality soon won him many friends at the colony. In 1905, Hoffman settled in Old Lyme and worked as a full member of the artist colony. He was particularly influenced by Willard Leroy Metcalf, an Impressionist also working in Old Lyme. Fellow artists later fondly recalled Hoffman's antics at the Griswold house, which included playing the flute and banjo, tap-dancing, singing humorous songs, and performing magic tricks. In 1910 Hoffman...

Addison Thomas Millar Lady in a Interior Oil on canvas board 14 x 10 inches Millar's father emigrated to the United States from Scotland in 1845. He grew up in Warren, Ohio. During his primary education, he took some painting lessons from John Bell, a local landscape painter. In his late teens, he won three consecutive awards from The Youth's Companion, in their annual art contests. This prompted his parents to allow him to go to Cincinnati to take formal lessons from the genre painter, De Scott...

Vaclav Vytlacil Woman Reading in an Interior, circa 1915 Signed lower right Oil on canvas 16 x 20 inches As a child, Vytlacil had taken art classes at the Art Institute of Chicago....

Signed lower right. A beautiful painting of a woman with her back to the viewer, watering a plant in front of an old brick wall. She is wearing a red skirt. A fruit arrangement sits...