Leo Engels

Leo Engels studied art at the prestigious Antwerp Academy. A stellar student, Engels won the Van Lerius Prize in 1907, followed in 1908 with his winning of the de Keyser Prize for art. Upon graduating, Engels commenced his career as a painter in oils, adopting a post-Impressionist technique. Engels specialized in still-lifes, figurative pieces, interiors, landscapes and seascapes. Many of his seascape pieces depicted views of the Belgian coastline and were handled with sensitivity to light and shade. His still-lifes were usually square in format and had the darker backgrounds traditionally preferred by the Flemish painters since the 17th century. His landscapes, however, were considerably lighter and more vibrant. A major retrospective on the life and paintings of Engels was held in St. Nicolas-Waan in 1970.