James Ensor

James Sidney Ensor ( born April 13, 1860 in Ostend, † November 19, 1949 ) was a Belgian painter and draftsman who was paintings also created a variety of etchings and drypoint. Ensor is assigned to the symbolism and is regarded as a precursor of Expressionism. But he became known as the "painter of masks ".

Life

The artist's father, James Frederic Ensor, was of English origin. He tried to make his fortune in America, failed and ended up as a city known drunkard. The mother, Maria Catharina Haegheman was Flämin and ran a small shop selling gifts and carnival masks, which were to play later in Ensor's work a major role.

He left school at the age of 15 and went on painters apprenticed before he in 1876 attended the Academy of Fine Arts in Ostend. Ensor studied from 1877 to 1880 at the Academy of Fine Arts in Brussels, where Fernand Khnopff was his classmate, the study then broke off but because he felt copying the old masters as little conducive to creativity in his own words. In 1880 he returned to Ostend, where he spent most of his life.

1881 Ensor had his first exhibition. The height of his popularity he achieved in the late 1920s, where he several major exhibitions have been devoted in Germany and Paris. In 1929, he received from King Albert the title of baron.

His grave is located on the dune cemetery of Ostend.

Performance

Ensor was first influenced by impressionism for a short time and the works of William Turner.

His work can be roughly divided into three phases:

• The early period in which he was mainly active as a caricaturist, draftsman and etcher,
• The middle phase, from which his main works are (like his most famous painting, the monumental painting Christ's Entry into Brussels ( 1888), now in the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles hangs)
• And the expressionistic oriented late work.

Already in 1883 were the focus of his work fantastic visions with demons, skeletons and especially repeatedly masks that put him among other things, in the tradition of Hieronymus Bosch. Ensor is considered to be the main representative of the Belgian Symbolism.

Works

• Skeleton, chinoiserie looking. Wallraf -Richartz Museum, Cologne 1885.
• Entry into Brussels Christ. J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, 1888.
• Still life in the studio. Oil on canvas, 83 x 113.5 cm. Neue Pinakothek, Munich, 1889.
• Fantastic still life. Oil on wood. Österreichische Galerie Belvedere, Vienna 1917