Page 26 - Studio Internatinal - October 1974

FROM THE TWENTY

TO THE TWENTIES

The development of Modernism in Belgium

FRANK WHITFORD

(Below) Antoine Wiertz (Right) Rene Magritte
La Belle Rosine 1897 L'Empire des Lumières III 1963
Oil on canvas, 190 x 100 cm Oil on canvas, 50 x 73 cm

— the word Flemish for the language of
Flanders has now been officially abandoned)
and these worthy and active bodies might be
accused of making matters worse. Each organizes
exhibitions at home and abroad. Each has a
substantial budget and exerts enormous
influence in the form of direct and indirect
patronage. An artist must be strong-willed
indeed to resist the temptation to stress, or even
suddenly to discover his French or Flemish
cultural genes in the hope of officially-aided
advancement. Many artists have therefore
moved abroad and continue to do so. Going
foreign is a sure way of realizing one's national
identity.
Writing about the official celebrations on the
occasion of his 70th birthday in 1933, Henry
van de Velde, one of Belgium's greatest artists
and one who himself had come to artistic
maturity abroad, had this to say: 'At the start
of the proceedings the Minister gave me a letter
in the name of King Albert I .... The letter was
in Flemish and the Flemings present were
delighted about this .... I reminded my guests
that I belonged to the generation which spoke
"Flemish only to servants and common people"
while writing and otherwise talking in French. I
spoke about the earlier difficult situation which
It is difficult for a foreigner, no doubt even for deprived of their birthright by the Dutch- had made Belgian writers like Charles de Coster,
a Welshman or a Quebequois, to understand the speakers who, situated in areas with the richest Camille Lemonnier, Georges Rodenbach, Emile
extent to which the language problem dominates natural resources, appear to dominate the Verhaeren, Maurice Maeterlinck, Charles van
Belgian life, thought and politics. Belgium is economy and too often to upset the delicate Lerberghe and Max Elskamp write in French and
one of the smallest and one of the most densely political balance in Brussels. It is ironic that which had persuaded many of them to move
populated countries in Europe. It is also one of Brussels, for so long the arena in which the permanently to Paris.' In Belgium the language
the youngest, imposed on the political map in linguistic battle has been fought, should now problem is never far away.
1830, and still suffers from the curious contain the twin Babel-towers of NATO and the Every problem has its positive side however.
circumstances of its birth, the multiplicity of EEC. Belgian art, like Belgian business, has been
nations it shares borders with and the three These facts are relevant to the state of art in enormously enriched by cultural cross-
languages (French, Dutch and German) spoken Belgium today. Art, like language, both fertilization. Just as cities like Bruges benefited
in its various parts. A Belgian is only a Belgian determines and reflects a country's culture and from the presence of large foreign colonies during
second: he is a Fleming or a Walloon first. Most most Belgian artists would claim that the the Middle Ages, so did the work of artists like
Flemings eye their Francophone compatriots permanent Flemish-French confrontation is van de Velde grow in importance as they
with suspicion, consider them to be cultural inhibiting and debilitating. There are two assimilated and eventually transcended French,
snobs. Most Walloons believe that they have been Ministries of Culture (the French and the Dutch English and German influences. At its best
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