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Léon Frédéric was born in 1856 in Brussels (Belgium) as the son of a wealthy jewellery salesman.
In 1874 Léon Frédéric followed art courses at the Brussels Academy des Beaux Arts. As a pupil of Jean-François Portaels, the tone of Frédéric’s work was largely formed by the Italian and Flemish art of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries and the poetic painting of the Pre-Raphaelites.
Two years in Italy (1876-78, Venice, Florence Naples and Rome), working with the Belgian sculptor Julien Dillens and exposed to the work of the Renaissance, gave him a sense of the profound beauty of Nature, its artistic potential of harmony, and the inherent dignity of human kind. Yet this was balanced by a personal sense of truthfulness to Nature, reinforced by the old Flemish painters who had directly studied their surroundings. Both Schools had depicted the world through clear, detailed compositions and their influence on the artist gives his work and unquestionable honesty, added to a personal, symbolist aura.
Léon Frédéric died in 1940 in Schaarbeek (Brussels, Belgium).
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