Collections in the spotlight

The Yper Museum recently acquired a folder containing beautiful academic drawings from a descendant of the Ypres painter Edouard Hennaert (1831-1886). Academic drawings are study drawings that were usually produced in a formally organised drawing school or elsewhere.

Alice Fischer was born on 18 May 1863 in Leuven. Her father, Achilles-Jean-Charles Fischer, was a major in the 1st Regiment of Mounted Hunters in Ixelles. When she was 10 years old, the family moved to Ypres. Her father Achilles was put in charge of the cavalry school there.

The photograph shows Louis Titz (Bruges, 1859–Brussels, 1932) at work on his easel. He is painting one of his many cityscapes of Ypres. Titz loved Ypres, and the city plays an important role in his oeuvre. He made his first working visit to Ypres in 1904 and the city continued to inspire him ever since.

Louise De Hem (1866-1922) caused a sensation at the end of the 19th century with her beautiful portraits and pastels. She built a professional and international career, which was not easy for a woman at that time. The name Louise De Hem later disappeared into the folds of history, the fate of many female artists. Thanks to the bequest of her sister Hélène, the Yper Museum owns the largest public collection of De Hems' works.

The Ypres Museum has one of the largest collections of insignia. Insignia or pins were extremely popular in the Middle Ages. From the late 12th century onwards, insignia were widely distributed throughout the Western world as popular and inexpensive mass-produced items. There are hundreds of different types of insignia. They range from the sacred to the very profane or worldly, from purely devotional to extremely sexual, from religious to superstitious.