Live Auction 7407Impressionist and Modern Works on Paper
James Ensor (1860-1949)

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James Ensor (1860-1949)
Bourgeois indignés sifflant Wagner en 1880 à Bruxelles
signed 'Ensor' (lower right); signed again 'Ensor' (on the reverse)
blue, red and black crayons on paper
9 1/8 x 12 in. (23.2 x 30.7 cm.)
Executed circa 1890

Baron François Gevaert, Brussels, by whom acquired directly from the artist circa 1890.
M. Halot, Brussels, the grandson of the above, and thence by descent; sale, Sotheby's, London, 1 July 1992, lot 146.
Acquired at the above sale by the present owner.

Specialist note

On the far right, the Baron François Gevaert, the Conservator of the Royal Conservatory in Brussels conducts an orchestra composed of members from his Conservatory in Wagner's opera Die Walkürie, one of Ensor's favourite musical pieces, which he heard in 1883 in Brussels. Above them, hanging in a frame, Wagner crying of anger and covering his ears up. The present drawing is closely related in subject and composition to the painting Au conservatoire, 1902 (Tricot, no. 389).