Antique Chelsea Harbour London Oil Painting 1915 Alfred Bastien (1873-1955) Belgian War Artist Ww1

Magnificient view of Chelsea Harbour/London in May 1915 by Belgian war artist Alfred Théodore Joseph Bastien (1873 –1955). Bastien was in London in 1915 as an officer in the Beligian army, whose artistic work was regularly published in British magasines.

The oil on (very thin) board presented here is signed at the lower right in mirror image/reverse writing, perhaps a sign that it was destined for publication. The size of the painting is 38 x 55 cm, measured without the frame.

Bastien attended the Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts in Ghent, where he studied with Jean Delvin. He then enrolled in the Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts in Brussels.] He won the Prix Godecharle there in 1897. He

traveled to Paris, where he enrolled in the École des Beaux-Arts . He was there when hostilities broke out in what would become the First World War.

After serving in the 'Garde Civique' like many other Belgians, Bastien fled to Great Britain after the fall of Antwerp in October 1914.

Despite his age (43) Bastien had volunteered for the Belgian Army. He was eventually transferred to the 'Section Artistique' in Nieuwpoort along with many of his pre-war artist friends and acquaintances. From 1915, he made many drawings and sketches of the situation on and behind the Belgian lines on the Yser river. The British war-time magazine 'the Illustrated War News', among others, regularly published

his work, quite often in distinctive and semi-panoramic, multi-color two-page spreads. In 1917, on personal request by Lord Beaverbrook who owned several of Bastien's pre-war paintings, he was seconded to the

Canadian Army until September 1918.

In July/August 1918, Lieutenant Bastien was attached as a war artist to the Canadian 22nd Battalion. Some of the work he created in this period is part of the Beaverbrook Collection of War Art at theCanadian War Museum in Ottawa.

Nous parlons français, und wir sprechen auch Deutsch! Paintings may be viewed in Norwich and in Paris, as well as in London and Cambridge by appointment. Please contact us if you would like further details and images of an artwork.