Provenance

Possibly, Adolphe Wansart (1873-1954), Brussels, gift of the artist

Private collection, Belgium

A leading Belgian sculptor at the turn of the twentieth century, Victor Rousseau was born in the Hainaut region, along the border of France. Of Walloon stock, he descended from a long line of stonemasons. He was sent by his father at the age of ten to work in a quarry. Within a year, he had joined his uncle and his father on the construction site of the new Palais de Justice in Brussels, where he worked as a stone carver of ornamentation for seven years, between 1877 and 1884. The foreman of the project, Georges Houtstont, noticed the young man’s talent for ornamentation and sent him to study drawing at the evening classes of the Academy Saint-Josse-ten-Noode.¹

In 1879, his friend and fellow artist, Jean Delville (1867-1953), suggested he attend drawing classes at the Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts, Brussels, where he studied with the Belgian sculptor and professor, Charles van den Stappen (1843-1910).  In 1890, he married and won the distinguished Prix Godecharle for sculpture with Tourment de la Pensée.  The prize allowed him to travel with his wife to England, France, and Italy for several years.

Rousseau exhibited in 1890 and 1893 at the Salon Triennal de Bruxelles and, beginning in 1895 he regularly exhibited at the Salon de La Libre Esthètique, an affiliate of the famous Salon des XX and the leading venue for young artists. He was named Professor of Sculpture at the Academy in 1901, and its director from 1919 to 1922, succeeding his master, van der Stappen. He served again as director of the Academy from 1931 through 1935.

In our unusual and mysterious drawing, a priest in severe clerical dress, with a pectoral cross hanging from a linked chain, seems to stare into the void.  His blank spectacles suggest that he may be blind; whether this is intended allegorically is unclear.  There is an almost unconscious Rosacrucian sensibility to this striking drawing.  It is not known whether Rousseau himself was involved with the Parisian Rose + Croix brotherhood, but his close friend Jean Delville was, exhibiting at the brotherhood’s salons regularly in the 1890s.

Rousseau’s approach to his subject, however, remains very much in the Symbolist mode, an artistic movement intrinsically Belgian and championed by such artists as Félicien Rops (1822-1898), Fernand Knopff (1858-1921), James Ensor (1860-1949), William Degouve de Nuncques (1867-1935), and his close friend, Jean Delville, to whose style this drawing most closely relates. In 1896, the year our drawing was made, Rousseau exhibited in Brussels at both the Salon d’Art Idéaliste and the Salon du cercle artistique et literature “Pour l’Art.”

The drawing is inscribed and dedicated “A Mr et Madame Wansart / En toute amitié et sympathie d'Art.” It is likely that “Monsieur Wansart “ is the Belgian painter and sculptor Adolphe Wansart, a contemporary of Victor Rousseau who lived in Brussels.