Belle époque - 1885-1914

Around the turn of the century, the succes of poster art was linked with the succes of fine and applied art, especially in the capital city. Dissatisfaction with the conservative climate in art gave rise to new artistic circles, such as "Les Vingt", "La Libre Esth�tique", "Le Sillon" and "L'Estampe" in Brussels and "L'Association pour l'Art" and "De Scalden" in Antwerp. These treated the poster as a genre of applied art in its own right. The communications of the "salons" were designed by their artists and formed a national variation of art nouveau.

In Brussels works by Th�o van Rysselbergh, Gisbert Combaz, Henri Meunier and Georges Lemmen shone. Victor Mignot, Fernad Toussaint, Adolphe Crespin and Edouard Duyck, too, contributed to the characteristic auality. In Antwerp, Henri van de Velde and Emile van Averbeke produced pearls of publicized modernism. The city of Schelde, far too deeply entrenched in the traditions of its own artistic past, had to give up the honorarary title of being the Belgian artistic centre to Brussels.

The dynamism of development of an artistic avant-garde was something which the litho printing houses were skilfully able to harness. A whole series of printers tried to contract the best poster designers to their own companies, and thus established their international reputation. Thus, for instance, seductive, mystical images of women, stylized figures, designed bu Privat-livemont, became trademarks of the J.L. Goffart printing works. Simple peasants or seaman, in a colourful setting, mostly in their natural environment, became the trademark of posters by Henri Cassiers, always printed by (O.) De Rycker & Mendel. These briljant works were frequently imitated or copied, but their quality was seldom attained.

Even more than all others, the city of Li�ge owes its iternational fame to the existence of a dynamic printing industtry. Armand Rassenfosse, Auguste Donnay and Emile Berchmans cemented their arstistic fame and their commercial success by collaborating with the A. B�nard printing works.

Economic and artistic potential of this kind did not exist in all regions. Many posters were mediocre in their inspiration and execution. Only those commission-placers with fat wallets could afford to attract the big names from Brussels of Li�ge.