The Félicien Rops Provincial Museum opens its doors again!
From 22 November 2003
From 22 November, an enlarged and completely renovated museum will welcome visitors to
present them the works of the permanent collection through a circuit and a setting design
enabling them to make a more dynamic and more comprehensive discovery of Félicien Rops’
creative work.
As a reminder, these renovation works, which began in 1999, have made it possible to enlarge
the museum by converting the neighbouring house, purchased by the Province of Namur in
1988, and so create two additional galleries and an audiovisual room. The restructuring and
renovation of the old museum followed in the spirit of the newly created space, including the
actual premises, the air-conditioning, the lighting and the documentation department, now
equipped with a work and reading room. The reception area has also been renovated and it is
currently equipped with multimedia resources, giving access to the Museum website, to the
Portal of museums in Wallonia and to an “Etching Route in Wallonia”.
The premises of the former coffee-roasting workshop, renovated in 1997, recover their earlier
vocation, which was to present temporary exhibitions. The former workshop will be the venue
where you will therefore be able to discover: Le cabinet de curiosités de Félicien Rops.
Caprice et fantaisie en marge d’estampes1, also from 22 November, presented until 29
February 2004 (see enclosed leaflet).
Let us go back to the actual tour of the museum. The governing idea is discovery through
separate areas, as opposed to a direct and all-encompassing view.
This idea is immediately confirmed when we arrive at the museum, in front of the very
differentiated façades of the old and new building: one, repainted in a light colour after the
manner of the façades of its period, the other, in a contemporary style, retaining its redbrick
surface.
The entrance hall leads visitors directly to the reception room rather than drawing their eyes,
as it previously did, to the opening leading out into the garden. In actual fact, the entrance hall
has been made opaque, allowing only the light to filter through. In this way, the discovery of
the garden (which is also scheduled to be renovated), and the sculptures planned to be
installed in the garden will be deferred till later on.
In the same spirit, several fixed windows placed in the entrance hall look onto the interior of
the library.
Upstairs too, openings, “gaze boxes” give a hint of the rooms to be discovered or provide a
glimpse of those you have just left.
1
Le cabinet de curiosités of Félicien Rops
Whim and fantasy in the margin of prints
These specific atmospheres are also created by the arrangement of veils spread along the outer
walls, which are stretched or tightened behind the pictures, so producing an effect that creates
and varies the gaps according to the themes of the works.
Showcases and drawers, desks, recesses, arranged in all the rooms, also allow the visitor to
take a more curious, more precise and probably a more in-depth look at a set of etchings,
letters, annotations, etc. which ask for nothing better than to be discovered. While, on the
uppermost floor of the museum, the space opens out and the presentation becomes more airy.
Lastly, during the actual tour, visitors “mark time” before discovering the artist’s most
notorious works: Pornokratès toys with their patience …
The tour begins with a biographical presentation of the artist, in connection with the artistic
and political events of the period; the first galleries are logically devoted to Rops’ first artistic
sallies, his life in Brussels, his significant artistic encounters in Belgium, the period of realism
...
The “Parisian Rops” comes next as the artist’s talent blossoms through his drawings and
paintings of nightlife (Le Bouge à Matelots, la Dèche, la Buveuse d’Absinthe, the “Dame au
Pantin” …).
A room is specially devoted to his etchings and highlights the Museum’s collection, enhanced
with educational showcases together with a video screen showing the various etching
techniques, tools and processes.
There is also the opportunity to discover the works of distraction, connected with Rops’
journeys and the places where he stayed, as well as the artist’s close relationships with the
literary world of his time though his work as an illustrator and also through his prolific
correspondence. Not forgetting, of course, the satanic and erotic works; they too have their
own separate room.
The Arts Department of the Province of Namur
Félicien Rops Museum, 12, rue Fumal, 5000 Namur
Tel.: 081 22 01 10 – Fax: 081 22 54 47
E-mail: rops@ciger.be
Website: www.ciger.be/rops
Open Tuesdays to Sundays, 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Open every day in July and August