FIRMIN BAES

(Saint-Josse-ten-Noode 1874 - 1945 Brussels)

L’Ardennes

Signed and dated lower right: Firmin Baes.

Pastel on canvas

32 x 25 1/2 inches (81.3 x 64.8cm)

Provenance:
Private collection, Belgium

This sensitive and virtuosic portrait by Firmin Baes epitomizes the artist’s impressive mastery of the pastel. Early in his career Baes exhibited works in charcoal and oil paint, then around the year 1900 he chose to focus more closely on pastels, creating beautifully naturalistic and highly finished works. His portraits were greatly sought after, and he sold more than two hundred to collectors throughout his lifetime. In addition to portraiture Baes also excelled at landscape painting, religious subjects, and particularly still life compositions, for which he drew comparisons to the virtuosic 18th century masters such as Jean-Baptiste-Siméon Chardin.

Son of the artist and architect Henri Baes, Firmin Baes started painting at a young age. He began his training at the Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts in Brussels in 1888, where he studied under the Symbolist Léon Frédéric (1856-1940) until 1894. That year he joined La Patte de Dindon, an artists’ group in which he met and shared studio space with Emile Fabry and Constantin Meunier, among others. In 1898 Baes joined the Belgian artists’ association Pour l’Art and exhibited work with them almost every year for the remainder of his career. He was an extremely disciplined painter and was known to strictly designate the first half of his days to portrait and figure painting, while landscapes, interiors and still life works were left for the afternoon and evening. This routine resulted in a body of work exceeding one thousand three hundred pictures. Baes was awarded the Order of the Crown in 1923 and later the Order of Academic Palms in 1930.

The current work depicting an elderly man in the sprawling hills of the Ardennes, the southeast region of Belgium, is an excellent example of Baes’ ability to elevate the pastel medium almost beyond recognition. At first glance the creases in the man’s face and the wisps of his hair seem to be rendered by brushstrokes. Upon closer consideration the vivid color spectrum composing the sleeve and the foliage of the landscape reveal the unmistakable blending of pastel. The overall quality of light is impressively realistic, while at the same time Baes’ use of tonality is inventive and painterly. This dynamic composition proves the artist to be a master of the landscape as well as a talented portraitist.