Albrecht De Vriendt

Albrecht Frans Lieven De Vriendt or Albrecht De Vriendt (In French-language publications referred to as Albert De Vriendt or Albert François Lieven De Vriendt) (Ghent, 8 December 1843Antwerp, 14 October 1900) was a Belgian painter known for his genre scenes, history paintings, interiors and figure paintings. He was also active as an author, publisher and copyist. He was also a watercolourist and an etcher. He participated in the monumentalist movement in Belgium and continued the tradition of the Belgian Romantic-historical school long after it had been abandoned in his country and abroad. He was the brother of the painter Juliaan De Vriendt with whom he often collaborated on decorative projects. He was a director of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of Antwerp. Albrecht's two-year older brother Juliaan De Vriendt and three-year older sister Clementine De Vriendt also became painters. He and his siblings were initially trained by their father, who conveyed his interest in Flemish art and language to his children. From an early age, he assisted his father in some of his decorative projects. From 1861, he exhibited some of his early works. In 1865, he moved to Antwerp, where his brother was already living. Here he studied under the painter Victor Lagye.

After a brief return to Ghent, Albrecht moved to Brussels, where he settled down. Here, he married in 1880 Laure Fiévé. The couple had five children. With his brother Juliaan, he made a number of journeys. In 1869, they visited Germany. In 1880, Albrecht travelled to Italy. That same year, the brothers journeyed through Egypt and Palestine. Numerous studies, watercolours, and pastel drawings of all kinds and sizes, as well as a faithfully executed and a jointly executed panorama, entitled The Death of Christ, were the fruits of this journey. The monumentalism movement was subsequently taken up by artists such as Jan Swerts and Godfried Guffens who had learned about the movement in Germany. Albrecht de Vriendt and his brother Juliaan also participated in the monumental art movement. One of the projects they worked on was the decoration of the Gothic room in the town hall of Bruges, a work that, after his death, was completed by his son, Samuel De Vriendt and his brother, Juliaan. In his role as a member of the provincial commission of the Royal Commission of Monuments, he also regularly advised on various projects for the renovation of monuments in Belgium.

When he died in 1900, his brother succeeded him in the position of director of the Antwerp Academy. An example of his work in this genre is Philip I conferring the Order of the Golden Fleece on his son Charles (1880, Brooklyn Museum) painted on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the independence of Belgium. De Vriendt used an event from Belgium's glorious past to help create the notion of a distinctive heritage and cultural identity for the young Belgian nation. In this work, De Vriendt depicts a lavish courtroom in which Philip the Handsome (1478–1506) bestows the Order of the Golden Fleece on his one-year-old son, Charles (1500–1558), who had been born in Ghent (De Vriendt's native town). Charles later became the most powerful ruler of Europe. De Vriendt demonstrates in this work his skill in the rendering of fabrics as well as a sensitivity in depicting the confused expression of the infant Charles.

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