Sneyers, Léon

Identity

Category

Person (Male)

Alternative name or descriptor

Standardized form(s) of name according to other rules

Status

  • Amateur / Connected

Details

Life dates

Brussels, 1877 - Brussels - Uccle, 1948

Activity

1898 - 1912 Bruxelles, Rue des Ursulines, 39
Jean Philippe Léon, ° 23.7.1877; + 24.9.1948. Architect-decorator, designer, art dealer and publicity agent, active from 1894. Also supplies for photographers at this address, according to the Mertens directory. Initiated into photography as an adolescent, when only 17 years old he was the president of a camera club for students, the "Detectiv-Club Belge". Pictorialist. Landscapes, portraits and nudes. Secretary and leading light of the "Cercle d’art photographique l’Effort" (see that name). Member of the "Club d'amateurs photographes de Belgique", which published several of his photographs in its "Bulletin".
Both pupil and emulator of Paul Hankar, he discovered Viennese Secession architecture at the Turin exhibition in 1902. His surviving art nouveau buildings in Brussels include a house-cum-studio for the painter Albert Cortvriendt, Rue de Nancy, 6-8 and a shop front for Majolaine, Rue de la Madeleine, 7.
Commissioned by the government to design and decorate the science installation at the International Exhibitions in Liège, 1905, Brussels, 1910, and Ghent, 1913, and to design the Belgian installation at the exhibitions in Turin, 1902, Milan, 1906 and Venice, 1906-1907. He became a propagator of Viennese art nouveau via "L'Intérieur", his art studio in Brussels at Rue de Namur, 9 which opened in 1906 and closed in 1918; thereafter Galerie Sneyers, Boulevard de Waterloo, 9 from 1918 to 1926. Collections of drawings and photographs in the "Archives d'Architecture Moderne" (AAM), Brussels. These constitute the small proportion of Sneyers' archives saved from destruction in 1969.

Locations

1898 - 1912 Bruxelles, Rue des Ursulines, 39

Exhibitions

Caen, 1897; Dunkirk, 1897; Roanne, 1897; Brussels, 1898; Nancy, 1898; Caen, 1899; Ghent, 1899; Brussels, 1901; Caen, 1901; Effort, 1901; Groningen, 1901 Kunst; Brussels, 1902; Effort, 1902; Paris, 1902; Turin, 1902 (gold medal); Antwerp (CEPSA), 1903; Budapest, 1903; Effort, 1903; Hamburg, 1903; Lille, 1903; Marseille, 1903; Paris, 1903; Saint Petersburg, 1903; Effort, 1904; New York, 1904; The Hague, 1904; Effort, 1905; Genoa, 1905; Paris, 1905; Vienna, 1905; Vienna, 1905 CAM; Milan, 1906 (hors concours).

Genres / subject matter

Techniques

Bibliography/Webography

CULOT, M. "Léon Sneyers (1877-1949) ou la Sécession importée", Bulletin des Archives d'Architecture Moderne, n° 8, 1976, pp. 11-16.

Context

Affiliations

Management

Record source

DIRECTORY_1997#3912

Status

Level of detail

Dates of creation/revision

SFJ revised 27.1.2017, 6.7.2018, 1.1.2019, 27.2.2019 & 1.2.2021; SFJ revised 17.4.2021, 1.3.2023 & 6.3.2023 based on information supplied by M. Demaeght; MD revised 9.3.2023; SFJ revised 18.6.2023 & 21.7.2024 based on information supplied by M. Demaeght

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