Guillaume Geefs

This remarkable bust, no doubt a royal portrait, was superbly sculpted by Guillaume Geefs, court sculptor to Leopold I, King of the Belgians.

Geef's mastery of his medium is evident in the delicacy of the pearls and the elegance of the embroidery on the tunic which, coupled with the depth of expression on the young princess's face, bring the marble to life.

The fact that the bust is signed by Geefs as 'Statuaire de S.M. le Roi des Belges' indicates that the portrait was a royal commission. The sculptor had established a tradition of sculpting the children of King Leopold I, and it is likely that the present bust represents a child from a related princely house, such as that of Saxe-Coburg. In 1841, the same year the present bust was sculpted, Geefs received the prestigious commission for a bust of Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg, Queen Victoria's husband (the plaster model is housed in the Musées royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique, inv. no. 3086). Since Leopold I had engineered the marriage between his niece, Victoria, and his nephew, Albert, it is tempting to propose that the present bust may portray the couple's daughter Victoria, who was born on 21 November 1840. However, it appears that the child depicted here is older; this is supported by the 1841 bust of Princess Victoria by Emil Wolff, which shows a younger child.

The celebrated Belgian sculptor Guillaume Geefs trained in Antwerp, in Paris under Lorenzo Bartolini, and in Brussels before opening his own atelier in the latter city in 1836. Four years earlier he had already been appointed Royal Court Sculptor of Belgium. Aside from numerous portraits of the royal family, Geefs was therefore the recipient of many commissions for monuments in Belgium’s great cities. His performance at the important international exhibitions attracted the patronage of the English and Prussian Royal families, among other foreign patrons, placing him in the top ranks of sculptors of the mid-19th century. The British Royal Collection houses several works by Geefs, including a bust of Leopold I of the Belgians (1843).

RELATED LITERATURE

C. Engelen and M. Marx, Beeldhouwkunst in België vanaf 1830, Brussels, 2002, vol. II, pp. 762-765