James Ensor (Ensor James)

(1860-1949)
Born in Ostend, 13 April 1860. In 1877-1880 he studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp. Then he returned to Ostend, where he continued to paint and did business in the oyster shop, his mother. He was one of the founders of the Brussels group 'XX' and a member of the Antwerp Association 'Modern Art'. Ensor is better known as a painter, but continues to increase interest in his etchings. Artist called expressionist, impressionist, the forerunner of surrealism and modern fantasy art, a follower of Brueghel and Bosch. From the pictures the life of the bourgeoisie in the early period, he eventually turned to a grim symbolic and fantastic compositions depicting grotesque masks and skeletons as in painting, and in etchings. In 1929 the artist received the title of Baron. Ensor died in Ostend, 19 November 1949