Charles in a Striped Jersey

This 1898 portrait by Henri Evenepoel shows a boy named Charles wearing a striped jersey, a simple garment that the painter makes the visual centre of the scene. The figure sits within an interior, and the contrast between the jersey's stripes and the muted background structures the composition and guides the eye. The painting was donated in 2008 to the Heritage Fund of the King Baudouin Foundation, in honour of Anne and André Leysen, and is now on long-term loan to the Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp. Its domestic subject and direct treatment of a child's figure show Evenepoel's interest in intimate portraits of people close to him rather than formal representation. The work is most interesting for how an everyday motif becomes a study of light, colour and linear rhythm.

Painter

Henri Evenepoel

Date

1898

Medium

oil paint, canvas

Dimensions

73 × 50 cm

Museum

King Baudouin Foundation

Depicts

jersey, floor, boy

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