Discover Benelux | Museums Special | Belgium & France
LEFT: Gaston Bertrand, Portrait of Alla Goldschmidt, 1990 , Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium, inv. 11071 © RMFAB, Brussels / Photo: J. Geleyns – Art Photography. RIGHT: Marc Chagall, I and The Village, 1912, Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium, inv 11108 © Chagall © SABAM Belgium / Photo: J. Geleyns – Art Photography
Broaden your horizons at the Royal Museums of Fine Arts in Brussels TEXT: PETER STEWART | PHOTOS: ROYAL MUSEUMS OF FINE ARTS OF BELGIUM
Home to a treasure trove of western art, this iconic museum in the heart of the Belgian capital is hoping to woo visitors this year with a series of carefully curated exhibitions that will give art a whole new meaning. If you are planning a city break to Brussels in the coming months, be sure to add the Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium to your list of places to visit. Founded in 1801 by Napoléon Bonaparte, this impressive collection of museums is the largest repository of fine art in Belgium and is home to more than 20,000 drawings, sculptures and paintings from the 15th to the 21st centuries. This pres18 | Issue 52 | April 2018
tigious family of museums comprises the Old Masters Museum (ancient art), where visitors can immerse themselves in Bruegel’s works via a wide range of virtual experiences; the Magritte Museum, home to the world’s largest collection of paintings by the Belgian artist; the Fin-de-Siècle Museum, which offers an artistic overview of Brussels around 1900 with masterpieces from Ensor, Rodin, Gauguin and Horta; the Modern Museum; and two artist’s studios, the Wiertz Museum and the Meunier Museum. The museums are also home to an extensive collection of Flemish works, with paintings by such greats as Bruegel the elder - including his iconic Fall of the rebel angels - Roger van der Weyden, Anthony van Dyck, and Jacob Jordaens,
as well as the ‘Rubens Room’, home to more than 20 paintings by the artist. The good news is that there is even more to see in 2018 as this Belgian institution will play host to some truly outstanding exhibitions this spring and summer. One exhibition not to miss is Promises of a face which retraces more than six centuries of portraiture, through a wide range of paintings, drawings, sculptures and photographs from artists including Rubens, van Dyck, Gauguin, Chagall and Bacon to name but a few. The exhibition, which opens on 23 March and runs until 15 July, starts by exploring the birth of the individual in 15th century art