SMEERS Frans

CINERAIRES FOND BLEU

Oil on canvas: 70.5 x 87.5 cm / 27.7 x 34.4 in
Signed lower right; titled on the reverse: 'Cinéraires fond bleu'

Painter of beach scenes, portraits and figures; draughtsman, engraver and etcher.

Frans Smeers was born in Brussels on January 28, 1873 and also deceased there on June 1, 1960.

He was a pupil of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of his birthplace under Jean-François Portaels and Joseph Stallaert. He made his debut in the artistic group ‘Le Sillon’ in 1895. He lived in London and the Netherlands from 1915 till 1919. He was often inspired by the coastal landscapes of the North Sea in Ostend and Newport and he painted many sunlit and colourful beach scenes.

He exhibited at the Salons of Brussels, Ghent and Ostend, but also in Geneva, London, Barcelona, Venice, Paris and Munich, where he won the gold medal in 1913.

He was a professor at the Brussels Royal Academy of Fine Arts from 1933 till 1946.

Period:
Brussels 1873 - 1960
Belgian School

Exhibitions:
Brussels - Ghent - Ixelles (Brussels)

Literature:
P.& V. Berko, "Dictionary of Belgian painters born between 1750 & 1875", Knokke 1981, p. 592.