Roses in an Angel Vase

Pascal de Beucker was born in Antwerp in 1861 and died in Schilde in 1945. He trained at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp, where he studied under Charles Verlat’s successors, including Farasyn and Lauwers. After completing his studies, he began exhibiting at several of Belgium’s leading Salons, where his refined figurative paintings earned him numerous medals and prizes.

Although de Beucker is often remembered as one of Belgium’s finest still-life painters at the turn of the twentieth century, he was equally accomplished as a portraitist and figure painter. His work is distinguished by a remarkable attention to detail, refined technique, and a sensitive handling of light and texture. His portraits of prominent figures were particularly admired for their precision and psychological presence, while his floral still lifes reveal both decorative richness and technical mastery.

In 1904, de Beucker left Belgium for the United States and settled in Springfield, Illinois. There, he became highly sought after as a portrait painter, building an important reputation for the exceptional quality and finish of his work. A notable secular figurative painting from this American period, depicting a young girl seated on a marble bench and dated 1908, is considered to belong to his finest and most accomplished phase.

He returned to Belgium in 1910, married, and settled in Mortsel. From this period onward, he increasingly devoted himself to the floral compositions for which he is now best known. During the First World War, he briefly resided in the Netherlands before returning to Belgium, where he continued to work steadily until his death in 1945.

De Beucker’s works are represented in museum collections, including the Albert Van Dyck Museum, which organized a major retrospective of his life and work in 2000. His paintings have also been associated with institutions such as the Art Museum of America in San Francisco (IAMA). He is listed in standard reference works including BAS I and Two Centuries of Signatures of Belgian Artists (Piron, BT).

Today, Pascal de Beucker is regarded as an important representative of late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Belgian painting, admired both for his virtuoso still lifes and for the rare but significant examples of his secular figurative compositions.