Edmond De Maertelaere (1876 - 1938) Old Woman, Pont Aven

On October 8, 1876, Edmond De Maertelaere was born in Ghent. At the age of 14, Edmond already won a first prize in decorative drawing at the Nivelines school. Then he enrolled at the "Royal Academy of Drawing, Sculpture and Architecture of the City of Ghent", as it was called at the time, he left this institution in 1898 as a laureate, receiving the medal gold and a bonus of three thousand francs. With this money, which represented a small fortune at the time, Edmond De Maertelaere went to Paris and perfected his skills for two years at the Académie Julian. This bonus also allows him to travel to Florence, Rome, Vienna and Munich to study the work of the great masters. In Pont-Aven, in Brittany, he found an ideal artistic climate. After the Parisian period, Edmond De Maertelaere moved to the St. Elisabeth beguinage in Ghent and lived there all his life. Once appointed professor at the Academy of Ghent, he showed remarkable restraint. He participated neither in major official group exhibitions nor in local group exhibitions. His consistent independent character initially worked against the diffusion of his name. However, he simultaneously had the advantage that his drawings, watercolors, gouaches, pastels and paintings were appreciated and purchased by a connoisseur public. Edmond De Maertelaere loved Ostend and often stayed there. For his time, this artist was a man who traveled widely and worked, and frequently exhibited abroad. He visited Germany, England, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Austria, Spain and Switzerland on several occasions. In addition to all this, he also designed numerous posters, for example, for the Ghent Floralies, stained glass windows for churches, illustrated books, painted numerous murals. Edmond De Maertelaere belongs to this generation of artists, most of whom were relegated to the background by the rise of expressionism between the two world wars. Poetic realism, here and there influenced by symbolism, was no longer anchored in an atmosphere of ideoplastic expression and form language. De Maertelaere has received numerous awards, first prizes and other official recognitions in Belgium and abroad. His works appear in the museums of Ghent (including the Museum of Fine Arts), Sao Polo, Rio De Janeiro, Texas, Vienna, Stockholm and in numerous private collections.