Barki Gergely et al.: Czóbel. A French Hungarian painter - ArtMill publications 5. (Szentendre, 2014)
Gergely Barki: Czóbel from Paris to Paris 1903-1925
39. Béla Czóbel: Worker in Brügge (Fisherman), 1905. Private collection 40. Béla Czóbel: Old Woman from Brügge, 1905. Private collection 12 Horváth 1961. 13 Tábori Kornél: Párizs magyarjai. Hogyan boldogulnak? Hogyan zülenek el? [Hungarians of Paris. How Do They Cope and Become Depraved?] Budapest, n.d. [1911], p 83. 14 György Bölöni mentions to his future wife Itóka in a letter that Czóbel recommended a summer vacation for them in Heist, north of Ostende. Bölöni-Itóka, p 55. a foreign shadow on Czóbel’s ‘Nagybánya-ness’. In spring of the next year, he displayed a painting under the title Enfant en Robe Rose (or Little Girl in Pink Dress). Based on its style, it can be dated to around 1905, and the little girl’s lacy, typically Flemish attire makes it probable that this picture brings the number of Czóbel works completed in Belgium in 1905 to more than half a dozen (Plate 41). Although the aforementioned portrait of Andor Dobai-Székely (from around 1905, but now lost) can be tied to the Brügge period, it was painted in Paris.12 Like Dobai, Czóbel, too, painted landscapes in Belgium. This is alluded to by a painting that appeared in the 1906 catalogue for the Salon des Indépendants under the title Paysage Decorative (Zeebrügge) (or Decorative Landscape, Zeebrügge), which is either lost or unidentifiable today. In all certainty, he painted the view Town Detail (now at the Czóbel Museum of Szentendre) in Brügge (Plate 38). In the recent years, a completely unknown landscape has come to light, also from 1905, depicting barks in Zeebrügge (Plate 42), on which Czóbel also recorded the setting below his signature. He dedicated the picture to Kornél Tábori, who makes mention of Czóbel in his book on the Bohemian painters’ world of Paris.13 These recently discovered czóbel works from Belgium present the possibility that the already known In the Square (or Corner of the Market Square) was perhaps not painted in Paris (as previously believed), but in Ostende or at the seaside possibly of Zeebrügge or Heist (Plate 45).14 Alluding to this, in part, is the characteristic Flemish folk clothing, the lacy kerchiefs, and the motif of the little boy playing in the sand in the centre of the picture. It can be presumed, on the basis of the buildings’ characteristics, that the painting Castle Park (once owned by Marcell Nemes) was also prepared in Belgium (Plate 43). The typically Flemish blue porcelain also suggests that the 36 CZÓBEL, A FRENCH HUNGARIAN PAINTER
