Mu.ZEE

Léon Spilliaert in Mu.ZEE

By Dr. Stefan Huygebaert, curator of Mu.ZEE

Mu.ZEE manages the largest collection of Spilliaert’s works worldwide in the artist’s home town Ostend, offering a comprehensive overview of virtually every genre, motif, technique, material and period of his career. The two museums - PMMK and MSK - from which the Mu.ZEE collection originated in 2010, collected work by Spilliaert as Mu.ZEE does today.

The Provincial Museum of Modern Art (PMMK), founded in 1957 and housed in the museum building in Romestraat since 1986, focused on Flemish art from Flemish Expressionism onwards. Curator Willy Van den Bussche also dedicated space to Spilliaert, whom he considered a transitional figure. The PMMK purchased six early works from the artist’s widow Rachel Vergison in 1966, including Marine with Wake (1902) and Beach with Moon (1908).

The Ostend Museum of Fine Arts (MSK), founded in 1893, acquired works by Spilliaert during his lifetime. The collection was housed in the town hall and the library on Wapenplein. Like Spilliaert’s parental home at 2 Kapellestraat, this building and a substantial number of works of art, along with the records of their provenance, were destroyed by incendiary bombs in May 1940. At least two of Spilliaert’s works were lost. Due to the fire, ten of the 110 unique works in the current collection have an inconclusive provenance.

The Spilliaert collection was posthumously expanded, especially under curator Frank Edebau. Between 1947 and 1972, for example, the city purchased twenty works, including the masterpieces The gust and Self-Portrait with Red Pencil, from Rachel Vergison. Works such as Portrait of Andrew Carnegie (from Henri Vandeputte in 1952) and Vertigo (in 1975) were also acquired on the art market. The collection continued to grow through donations from close friends and family of the artist, such as his daughter Madeleine, sister Rachel and the widow of good friend Adolphe Van Glabbeke. The Vrienden van de Stedelijke Musea and their successors, the Vrienden van Mu.ZEE, Xavier Tricot and other donors also contributed to the collection. In 2024, Mu.ZEE was the first institution in Flanders, following the decree amendment of 10 March 2023, to be entrusted with a work of art as an inheritance tax payment, the watercolour Dolls. The Marquis and the Tyrolean Girl from 1928. Since 2020, the museum has also had several Spilliaert works on long-term loan from a growing private collection.

The graphic collection, which began taking shape mainly from the late 1980s onwards, is virtually exhaustive, with just about all the series of print and illustrated collections, individual etchings and lithographs and magazine illustrations - in addition to many unique designs for collections and series such as Plaisirs d'hiver and Au temps que Nanette était perdue. Finally, Mu.ZEE also has some Spilliaert memorabilia such as a pastel box, a perfume bottle and a New Year’s letter.