Artwork Data

Title

Kind met eend en vogeldrinkbak

Artist

Françoise Carbasius

Year

1930/32

Material

Brons

Artwork Location

Address

Stadhouderslaan, Den Haag

City district

Scheveningen

GPS data

52.089357437264, 4.2812789160774 View on map

Artwork Description

Text

Initially it was not obvious that Françoise Carbasius would become a sculptor. At the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague she obtained an M.O. drawing certificate. But once she had worked with clay, she knew that this was her material. None other than the Flemish sculptor Toon Dupuis (1877-1937) became her teacher. At the time, she spent a lot of time with Gra Rueb (1885-1972), another well-known animal sculptor from The Hague, who was also a pupil of Dupuis. Together they completed their training in Paris at the Ecole des Beaux Arts.

As a sculptor, Carbasius mainly limited herself to small sculptures, animal and garden sculptures, medals and portraits. Craftsmanship and lifelike quality are typical of her sculptures. She shares with many colleagues her fascination for the cross-pollination between drawing and sculpture.

In her home town of The Hague, she became known for her sculptural decoration of bridges. Together with her colleagues Dirk Wolbers, Dirk Bus, Rueb and Joop van Lunteren, she embellished many a bridge in the tradition of the Amsterdam School (1916-1926), which was already experiencing its heyday at the time. The bridge over the Gietkom on Prinsessegracht, for instance, is adorned with a lifelike fish otter.

The figurative sculpture in the garden of the Kunstmuseum Den Haag was purchased by the municipality of The Hague in 1932. The idyllic little scene is in keeping with the ideology of the Amsterdam School, which believed that art belonged to the people and should therefore be fully integrated into everyday life. In practice, this meant that ordinary, simple life had to be depicted as realistically as possible. Carbasius did this with love and devotion.

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