Éliane de Meuse

Éliane Georgette Diane de Meuse (9 August 1899 – 3 February 1993) was a Belgian painter. She was the wife of Max Van Dyck. They met at the Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts, Brussels where they attended the courses of the same professors. Eliane de Meuse took her first drawing lessons at the age of fourteen with Ketty Hoppe, the wife of the Belgian painter Victor Gilsoul. She also trained in the studio of the genre painter Guillaume Van Strydonck, member of Les XX and James Ensor's friend. At the same time, she received advice from the sculptor Marcel Rau, Prix de Rome 1908. In 1916, Meuse decided to become a painter and joined L'Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts, Brussels. There, she met the young painter Max Van Dyck, (23 December 1902, (Brussels – Schaerbeek) – 26 December 1992, (Brussels – Ixelles) and married him in 1922. The latter had won the great Prix de Rome (Belgium) in 1920 when he was only 17 years old, a sensational event widely commented on in the Belgian press. He later taught the Decorative arts at the Académie des beaux-arts d'Anderlecht of which he eventually became the director. At the Academy (ARBA, Brussels) Meuse was the student of the Symbolist painter Jean Delville and the portraitist Herman Richir. From all of these influences, her art developed into a style similar to Post-Impressionism, her subject matter including portraits, figures, seascapes, landscapes and still lifes. In some of her latest paintings underlying abstract structure can be observed. Critics noted that Eliane de Meuse had inherited much from the Belgian Luminism, movement of the very early 20th century, which combined aspects of Realism (Realist visual arts), Impressionism and Neo-Impressionism. It got its name from the style of Emile Claus and a few other painters, grouped in a circle called Vie et Lumière (Life and light) of which Claus was one of the main founders. Charles Bernard, the foremost Belgian critic at that time wrote that he considered the art of Eliane de Meuse as aimed towards a pure, clear artistic ideal, without any selfish motives.