Jules de Bruycker

1870–1945, Ghent

Jules de Bruycker studied, with a lengthy interruption, at the Academy of Art in his native city of Ghent, where Théo Canell and Jean Delvin were among his teachers. Initially he concentrated on drawings and watercolours, but the renown he later acquired was attributable primarily to his expressive, brilliantly executed etchings which, in the view of art critics, earned him the rank of “the greatest Belgian etcher after Ensor”. From 1924 to 1935 de Bruycker was a professor at the Royal Academy of Art in Antwerp and from 1925 a member of the Académie Royale de Belgique. He maintained close ties with his native Ghent throughout his lifetime and regularly explored the architecture and life in the city in his works of art.