Herinnering aan een zondag: P.-G. Van Hecke en de kunstenaars in de jaren 1920

The impetus for the exhibition Memory of a Sunday is the painting by Edgard Tytgat from the museum’s collections. It represents one of the many Sundays spent in the Lys region where P.-G. Van Hecke would invite artist friends to his country retreat Malpertuis in Afsnee-aan-de-Leie. In the 1920s, artists including Marc Chagall, Ossip Zadkine and Valentine Prax would visit, while Gust De Smet and Frits Van den Berghe would stay for extended periods and even paint some of their best works in the house of Van Hecke in Afsnee. The meetings that took place at that time, organised by P.-G. Van Hecke, would play a determining role in the development of the work of these artists.

The exhibition documents and illustrates the artists’ meetings and the art network around P.-G. Van Hecke in the 1920s using paintings, sculptures, drawings and archival material. The selection includes important works by both Belgian (Frits Van den Berghe, Floris and Oscar Jespers, Gust De Smet, Edgard Tytgat, etc.) and foreign artists (Ossip Zadkine, Marc Chagall, Heinrich Campendonk).