The Belgian symbolist Auguste Donnay–less familiar today than his contemporaries Fernand Khnopff and Xavier Mellery–trained at the Academy in Liège, followed by a sojourn in Paris from 1887 to 1888.[1] Donnay produced drawings and illustrations and designed covers for the Almanach des poètes in the 1890s. At the world exhibition in Liège in 1905, celebrating Belgium’s 75-year independence, Donnay became a protagonist for a Walloon style as the signature for Flemish painting.

Donnay’s own interest was mostly in mystic figures associated with nature such as fauns and melancholic women leaning against trees. The mythological nymph hamadryade, half human-half tree, is the perfect protagonist for the artist. In this sheet, her elongated limbs extend and transform into branches, her skin tone emulating the color of the surrounding trees. When Donnay’s childhood friend, the artist Armand Rassenfosse (1862-1934), introduced him to Félicien Rops (1833-1898) in 1892, their interaction was paramount for the young artist.

The term Art Nouveau first appeared in the Belgian art journal L’Art Moderne in 1884 to describe the work of Les XX. While the movement was an international response to academic art of the nineteenth century, inspired by natural forms and the curved lines of plants and flowers, artists in Belgium developed their own stylistic language often inspired by novelties and material from Africa’s Congo Free State ruled by King Leopold II as his private possession since 1885. Pillaging the country from its lucrative rubber and precious minerals, Belgians looted an additional 180,000 items. In preparation for the world exhibition of 1887 in Brussels, abundant supplies of ivory, tropical woods and metals were made available to artists.

The unprecedented economic prosperity and overseas expansion of fin-de-siècle Belgium provided progressive artists with elite patrons and budgets awash in Congo dividends.[2] Invigorated by the successful African venture, artistic creativity was expressed in architecture, decorative and fine arts throughout the country. Donnay’s Hamadryade may have well been inspired by Congo motifs and the Coup de Fouet or whiplash style so fashionable at the time.

[1] Stefan van den Bossche, Zuiver en ontroerend beweegloos. Prerafaëlitische sporen I the Belgische kunst en literatuur, Antwerpen-Apeldoorn 2016, pp. 369-370

[2] Deborah Silverman, “Art Nouveau, Art of Darkness: African Lineages of Belgian Modernism, Part I”, West 86th, Vol. 18, no. 2, 2011, pp. 130-181, p. 144