Antoine Wiertz
Twenty-one young girls
Oil on canvas
20 x 30
Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium
Antoine Joseph Wiertz (22 February 1806 – 18 June 1865) was a Belgian romantic painter and sculptor.
Antoine Wiertz
Satan, c. (1840)
Oil on paper
37 x 60
Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium
Born in Dinant from a relatively poor family, he entered the Antwerp art academy in 1820. Thanks to his protector Pierre-Joseph de Paul de Maibe, a member of the Second Chamber of the States-General, king William I of the Netherlands awarded an annual stipend to Wiertz from 1821 onwards. Between November 1829 and May 1832, he stayed in Paris, where he studied the old masters at the Louvre.
Attributed to Antoine Wiertz
HELL FALL OF THE DAMNED
Oil on canvas
76 X 56 cm
Private collection
In 1828, Wiertz came out second in the competition for the prestigious Prix de Rome which he attained on his second attempt in 1832; it enabled him to go to the French Academy at Rome, where he resided from May 1834 until February 1837. Upon his return, he established himself in Liège with his mother.
Antoine Wiertz (1806–1865)
The Greeks and the Trojans Fighting over the Body of Patroclus, c. 1836
Oil and canvas
Height: 395 cm (12.9 ft); Width: 703 cm (23 ft)
Musée des beaux-arts de Liège
A fight breaks out over Patroclus’s body. Euphorbus, the Trojan who first speared him, tries to strip him of Achilles’ armor but is killed by Menelaus. Hector, spurred on by Apollo, sees Euphorbus’s fall and comes to help. Menelaus enlists the help of Great Ajax, who forces Hector to back down and prevents the body from being removed or desecrated. He arrives too late to save the armor, however, which Hector dons himself. Glaucus rebukes Hector for leaving Patroclus’s body behind and suggests that they might have traded it for Sarpedon’s. Hector reenters the fray, promising to give half of the war’s spoils to any Trojan who drags Patroclus’s corpse away. More on the ILiad
During his stay in Rome, Wiertz worked on his first great work, Les Grecs et les Troyens se disputant le corps de Patrocle ("Greeks and Trojans fighting for the body of Patroclus", finished in 1836), on a subject borrowed from book XVII of Homer's Iliad. It was exhibited in Antwerp in 1837, where it met with some success. Wiertz submitted the work for the Paris Salon of 1838, but it arrived too late and was refused. (See above)
Antoine Wiertz
The fable of the three wishes, c. 1836
Oil on canvas
28 x 40
Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium
Antoine Wiertz (1806–1865)
Human Insatiability
Oil on canvas
Musée Wiertz
Antoine Wiertz (1806–1865)
Triptychon; Christ at the tomb at center, Eve having the first worry after sin at left, Angel of Evil at right, c. 1839
Oil on canvas
Left: 134 × 67 cm (52.7 × 26.3 in)
Center: 134 × 162 cm (52.7 × 63.7 in)
Right: 134 × 67 cm (52.7 × 26.3 in)
Wiertz Museum
Antoine Wiertz (1806–1865)
Christ at the tomb
Oil on canvas
Center: 134 × 162 cm (52.7 × 63.7 in)
Wiertz Museum
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Antoine Wiertz (1806–1865) Eve having the first worry after sin 134 × 67 cm (52.7 × 26.3 in)
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Antoine Wiertz (1806–1865) Angel of Evil 134 × 67 cm (52.7 × 26.3 in)
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At the Paris Salon of 1839, Wiertz showed not only his Patrocles, but also three other works: Madame Laetitia Bonaparte sur son lit de mort ("Madame Laetitia Bonaparte on her deathbed"), La Fable des trois souhaits—Insatiabilité humaine ("The fable of the three wishes—Human insatiability") (See above), and Le Christ au tombeau ("Christ entombed") (See above). Badly hung and lit, his entry elicited indifference on the part of the public, and provoked sarcasm among the critics. This second humiliation led to a profound rancour against art critics and against Paris, as expressed in his virulent pamphlet Bruxelles capitale, Paris province.
In 1844, Wiertz painted a second version of his Patrocles on an even bigger scale than the first (the 1836 version measures 3.85m by 7.03m; the 1844 version 5.20m by 8.52). The Rome version is now in the Museum of Walloon Art in Liège, the 1844 in the Wiertz Museum in Brussels.
Antoine Joseph (Antonie) Wiertz (Belgian, 1806–1865)Title:
Archangel Michael defeats the rebel angels
Oil on canvas
112 x 85.5 cm. (44.1 x 33.7 in.)
Private collection
After the Paris disaster, Wiertz veered more and more to the excessive. A fine example is the monumental La Chute des Anges rebelles ("The Fall of the rebellious Angels", 1841), on an arched canvas of 11.53m by 7.93m; Archangel Michael defeats the rebel angels (See above)
Antoine Wiertz (1806–1865)
Deux jeunes filles ou La Belle Rosine/ Two Young Girls or The Beautiful Rosine, c. 1847
Oil on canvas
Height: 140 cm (55.1 in); Width: 100 cm (39.3 in)
Wiertz Museum
The death of his mother in 1844 was a terrible blow to the artist. He left Liège in 1845 to settle in Brussels for good. During this period he painted a confrontation of Beauty and Death, Deux jeunes filles—La Belle Rosine (1847) (See above), which remains perhaps his most famous work.
Antoine Joseph (Antonie) Wiertz (Belgian, 1806–1865)
On se retrouve au ciel' of 'La réunion des élus au Paradis, 1859
Oil on canvas
110 x 140 cm. (43.3 x 55.1 in.)
Private collection
Dissatisfied with the shiny effect of oil painting, he developed a new technique combining the smoothness of oil painting with the speed of execution and the dullness of painting in fresco. La Lutte homérique ("The Homeric struggle", 1853) was the first big-scale painting executed in this technique. However, the components used in this technique are responsible for the slow decay of the works produced with it.
Antoine Wiertz
Hunger, madness and crime, c. 1853
Oil on canvas
Wiertz museum
Antoine Wiertz (1806–1865)
La liseuse de romans/ The Reader of Novels, c. 1853
Oil on canvas
Height: 125 cm (49.2 in); Width: 157 cm (61.8 in)
Wiertz Museum
Antoine Wiertz (1806–1865)
The Suicide, c. 1854
Oil on canvas
Antoine Wiertz (1806–1865)
L'inhumation précipitée/ The Premature Burial, c. 1854
Oil on canvas
Height: 160 cm (62.9 in); Width: 235 cm (92.5 in)
Wiertz Museum
Antoine Wiertz (1806–1865)
Le dernier canon/ The last gun
Oil on canvas
Wiertz Museum, Brussels
Many of his works from the 1850s have a social or philosophical message, often translated in delirious imagery, like Faim, Folie et Crime ("Hunger, Madness and Crime", 1853) (See above), La Liseuse de Romans ("The Reader of Novels", 1853) (See above), Le Suicide ("The Suicide", 1854) (See above), L'Inhumation précipitée ("The premature burial", 1854) (See above), Le Dernier Canon ("The last gun", 1855) (See above).
Wiertz was also a fine portrait painter, who made self-portraits at various ages. As a sculptor, he produced his most important project towards the end of his life: a series of plasters representing Les Quatre Âges de l'Humanité ("The Four Ages of Humanity", 1860–1862), reproduced in marble for the Wiertz museum by Auguste Franck.
Antoine Wiertz
Diane au bain
Oil on canvas
66 x 82 cm
Private collection
Circle Antoine Wiertz
The torture of Prometheus
72 x 87 cm.
Private collection
Prometheus was the Titan god of forethought and crafty counsel who was given the task of moulding mankind out of clay. His attempts to better the lives of his creation brought him into conflict withZeus. Firstly he tricked the gods out of the best portion of the sacrificial feast, acquiring the meat for the feasting of man. Then, when Zeus withheld fire, he stole it from heaven and delivered it to mortal kind hidden inside a fennel-stalk. As punishment for these rebellious acts, Zeus ordered the creation of Pandora(the first woman) as a means to deliver misfortune into the house of man, or as a way to cheat mankind of the company of the good spirits. Prometheus meanwhile, was arrested and bound to a stake on Mount Kaukasos (Caucasus) where aneagle was set to feed upon his ever-regenerating liver (or, some say, heart). Generations later the great hero Herakles (Heracles) came along and released the old Titan from his torture. More on Prometheus
Influenced mainly by Rubens and the late Michelangelo, Wiertz' monumental paintings often moves between classical academism and lurid romanticism, between the grandiose and the ridiculous. Although his work was often derided as art pompier, his pictorial language nevertheless preannounced symbolism and a certain kind of surrealism, two currents that would be very strong in Belgian painting.
After difficult negotiations with the Belgian government, Wiertz was able to realize his dream to turn his last studio into a museum for his works. The Belgian State bought a piece of land and funded the construction of a huge hall to accommodate the painter's monumental works. In exchange, Wiertz donated all his works to the Belgian State, with the express proviso that they should remain in his studio both during and after his lifetime.
Antoine Wiertz (1806–1865)
The Young Sorceress, c. 1857
Oil on canvas
Wiertz Museum
Wiertz died in his studio. His remains were embalmed in accordance with Ancient Egyptian burial rites and buried in a vault in the municipal cemetery of Ixelles.
A copy of one of Antoine Wiertz's works, the statue of The Triumph of Light was once prominently located high on San Francisco's Mount Olympus between the Haight-Ashbury and Corona Heights. It had been presented to the city of San Francisco by Adolph Sutro in 1887. Over the years due to lack of care and maintenance the statue fell into disrepair. By the late 1930s, even the history and origins of the statue were no longer common knowledge in San Francisco, and by the mid-1950s, the statue disappeared. All that remains today is the pedestal and base of the monument. More on Antoine Joseph Wiertz
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