A Winter Scene

De Leeuw Alexis was born in 1848. He was a Belgian painter of genre scenes and romantic winter landscapes, richly decorated with figures and animals. He also painted several pastoral landscapes.

Almost nothing is known about his life, although he was successful, given the quality and scope of his oeuvre.

Alexis de Leeuw was influenced by the Dutch Romantics and specialized in an idyllic winter landscape with horses and dogs. Alexis De Leeuw painted from 1848 until 1883 and spent many years living and working in England. He exhibited in the 1860s at the Royal Academy, the British Institute of Art, the galleries of Suffolk Street and the Royal Hiberian Academy. His winter scenes were widely used to produce Christmas and greeting cards.

He was one of the Belgian representatives of the ‘horse genre’, to which Wouterus Verschuur (1812 – 1874), Dutch painter of anima belonged in The Netherlands. He worked together with the cattle Belgian Realist painter Frans van Leemputten (1850 – 1914).

He died in 1883 in Bruges. Today, his paintings can be found in private and public collections worldwide, including at the d’Orsay Museum in Paris and Bruges Museum.

Literature:

A Dictionary of Artists, Who Have Exhibited Works in the Principal London Exhibitions

Benezit Dictionary of Artists, Vol. VIII, Gründ, 2006

Lexicon of the Belgian Romantic Painters, Flippo, 1981

The Dictionary of Belgian Painters Born Between 1750 & 1875, Berko, 1981