Meditating with James Ensor (1860-1949)

The Man has often admitted, to his confidants, that he had taken the wrong path artistically: instead of painting, it was to music that James Ensor would have liked to devote his life. It must be said that in the Belgian artist's family homes, there was always an upright piano in the living room. He himself loved playing the piano, and later the harmonium on which he gave free rein to his imagination. Should we be surprised then that at the age of 21, in one of his rather wise youthful works, it is still the piano that takes pride of place?

In this bourgeois interior, the instrument faces us, unlike the two characters. The woman, dressed all in black, is Anna Boch (1848-1936), daughter of a rich Belgian industrialist, a painter herself and a great lover of impressionist paintings. The man, dressed in an elegant gray suit, is Willy Finch (1854-1930), also a painter, engraver and ceramist.

What connects them is this subtle language of music. Russian music, in this case, as the title of the work indicates. Is this a study by Rachmaninov? Or an extract from a Tchaikovsky concerto? As much as Anne seems captivated by her work as a musician, Willy lets himself be carried away into the distance, his gaze drawn to the opening of the window which is reflected, behind him, in the mirror. If everything seems calm, the music seems to make the floor beneath the furniture shake. It will also shake James Ensor who, tortured and free, will abandon his eclectic painting at the end of his life to devote himself to contemporary music.