Paul Delvaux Museum
The sight that literally dictates a stop or a stay in Oostduinkerke is a major museum devoted to the oeuvre of one artist: the Belgian surrealist Paul Delvaux. To view in one place nearly one hundred paintings by this important figure is to undergo an emotional battering, to arouse instincts and memories suppressed since childhood, to engage in an act of self-discovery.
Paul Delvaux, born in Brussels in 1897, still produces as many as four large paintings a year from his atelier in Veurne; he plans soon to move to a chalet on the grounds of the museum. For nearly fifty of his vigorous 91 years, he has struggled with an obsession that leaps vividly from every one of his striking and masterfully-done canvases, yet almost defies the effort to define it in words. The obsession relates to the female form, the nude or partially nude female in most instances, women unbearably beautiful, erotic, yet silent, impassive and alone, divorced from contact with men and with each other, absorbed in their own femininity. In a rare exception to the usually static theme, one makes love to a male statue. Though occasional men intrude, some fully clothed in professorial garb, others young men or boys totally nude, no man pays the slightest heed to the women.
The women are placed in an endless variety of patterns and poses, but mainly against three recurring settings: a deserted train station or trolley platform at night; a plaza of ancient Greece flanked by classic temples, columns, steps and arched facades; a chaise lounge or canopied bed on the portico of a Victorian home with ornamental iron decorations. Through numerous paintingswander skeletons, the most expressive skeletons in all the history of art, looking as if they still inhabited the bodies from which they came, human and alive in the stances they assume, the emotions they convey.
What does it all mean? Every one of us knows precisely what these paintings mean, because we experience a strong and distinct impact from each one, and yet are unable to articulate that experience in words; the reaction is an inner one and stems from our tempestuous sub-conscious. You may read a dozen learned treatises on Delvaux—one theory holds that he is repeatedly portraying his mother, who is therefore untouchable—and you may read Delvaux' own interviews on the work, and you will conclude that, like music, art of a certain level should never be interpreted with words, else why should its meaning have been conveyed through a painting?
It is fascinating, in the Museum of Paul Delvaux, to see earlier works of his before the obsession took hold. One is a superb, fiery, factory painting of the industrial revolution, evidence of his technical mastery; and it is perhaps sad that he has not applied those obvious gifts to broader themes. Yet like the memorable character in "One Hundred Years of Solitude", who sculpts one golden fish after another, only to melt each down and begin anew, he either seeks perfection or has found it in a simple, recurring image. And like Picasso or Matisse, who painted into their 90s, he is continuing to work and cannot stop. Though you will see at least one Delvaux in every major Belgian museum, and murals by him at the University of Liege, Brussels Convention Center, and Ostend Casino (only rare paintings by Delvaux have left Belgium), you will find no other grouping of his works, than there, capable of revealing his most extraordinary talent. Though he has painted incessantly for more than 60 years, Delvaux' output consists of only 370 paintings, each of epic quality.
The sight that literally dictates a stop or a stay in Oostduinkerke is a major museum devoted to the oeuvre of one artist: the Belgian surrealist Paul Delvaux. To view in one place nearly one hundred paintings by this important figure is to undergo an emotional battering, to arouse instincts and memories suppressed since childhood, to engage in an act of self-discovery.
Paul Delvaux, born in Brussels in 1897, still produces as many as four large paintings a year from his atelier in Veurne; he plans soon to move to a chalet on the grounds of the museum. For nearly fifty of his vigorous 91 years, he has struggled with an obsession that leaps vividly from every one of his striking and masterfully-done canvases, yet almost defies the effort to define it in words. The obsession relates to the female form, the nude or partially nude female in most instances, women unbearably beautiful, erotic, yet silent, impassive and alone, divorced from contact with men and with each other, absorbed in their own femininity. In a rare exception to the usually static theme, one makes love to a male statue. Though occasional men intrude, some fully clothed in professorial garb, others young men or boys totally nude, no man pays the slightest heed to the women.
The women are placed in an endless variety of patterns and poses, but mainly against three recurring settings: a deserted train station or trolley platform at night; a plaza of ancient Greece flanked by classic temples, columns, steps and arched facades; a chaise lounge or canopied bed on the portico of a Victorian home with ornamental iron decorations. Through numerous paintingswander skeletons, the most expressive skeletons in all the history of art, looking as if they still inhabited the bodies from which they came, human and alive in the stances they assume, the emotions they convey.
What does it all mean? Every one of us knows precisely what these paintings mean, because we experience a strong and distinct impact from each one, and yet are unable to articulate that experience in words; the reaction is an inner one and stems from our tempestuous sub-conscious. You may read a dozen learned treatises on Delvaux—one theory holds that he is repeatedly portraying his mother, who is therefore untouchable—and you may read Delvaux' own interviews on the work, and you will conclude that, like music, art of a certain level should never be interpreted with words, else why should its meaning have been conveyed through a painting?
It is fascinating, in the Museum of Paul Delvaux, to see earlier works of his before the obsession took hold. One is a superb, fiery, factory painting of the industrial revolution, evidence of his technical mastery; and it is perhaps sad that he has not applied those obvious gifts to broader themes. Yet like the memorable character in "One Hundred Years of Solitude", who sculpts one golden fish after another, only to melt each down and begin anew, he either seeks perfection or has found it in a simple, recurring image. And like Picasso or Matisse, who painted into their 90s, he is continuing to work and cannot stop. Though you will see at least one Delvaux in every major Belgian museum, and murals by him at the University of Liege, Brussels Convention Center, and Ostend Casino (only rare paintings by Delvaux have left Belgium), you will find no other grouping of his works, than there, capable of revealing his most extraordinary talent. Though he has painted incessantly for more than 60 years, Delvaux' output consists of only 370 paintings, each of epic quality.
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