Marine painting by well-known Belgian marine painter Auguste-Henri Frans Constant Musin (Ostend 1852 – Saint-Josse-ten-Node1923).

He was born in Ostend as the son of artistic parents, namely the marine painter François Musin (4 October 1820 - 24 October 1888) and the flower painter Marie-Celestine Gosselin (c. 1826 - March 1853).

He lived in Sint-Joost-ten-Node, with the exception of a few years when he lived in Paris (c. 1872) and in London (c. 1873-1876).

As the son of artistic parents, Auguste Musin was, as it were, destined to become a painter in turn, specializing in marine paintings.

This first artistic achievement gave him quite a beating. When he was fifteen his father acted as a teacher, Auguste was in fact the only pupil to be trained from an early age in his father´s studio. He was also allowed to take lessons at the Free Academy in the Twaalf Apostelenstraat and also took lessons in the music school. On June 28, 1865, at the age of thirteen, he already gave an exhibition in the restaurant of the oyster pits Musin (founded in 1846 by his grandfather François-Constant Musin) in Ostend. In 1869 Auguste Musin made his official debut at the Salons and since then he has become an integral part of almost all major Western European and American exhibitions.

In 1869 he already received his first award, a bronze medal, with drawings and sketches during an exhibition in Dunkirk, France.He married his cousin Clemence Musin on June 24, 1873 in London. Auguste Musin was awarded a gold medal at the Rouen exhibition on the same day. He was again medaled in 1874 at an exhibition in South Kensington, London.In 1876 they came back to live in Sint-Joost-ten-Node. He also had a second residence in Ruisbroek between 1877 and 1886.Auguste Musin led a quiet, middle-class artist´s life without significant heights or lows. He divided his time between travelling, painting and society life. He was one of the most prominent members of the "Cercle libre de l´Observatoire" in Brussels, an elitist, deeply conservative artists´ group. Every summer he stayed in Ostend, where he mingled in the spacious fashionable life in and around the Kursaal, and in artistic circles around James Ensor, Emile Spilliaert (1858-1913) (Léon Spilliaert was his great-nephew), Félix Buelens and Antoine Dujardin. .The writer and art critic Ernest Mathy rightly called him le digne heritier du pinceau paternel, because in his best works he can hardly be distinguished from his father stylistically. They are technically superb pieces of work, entirely within the realistic tradition, later also with some reminiscences of impressionism. Not unjustly, the official critique sometimes blamed Auguste Musin for his impersonality, the clear influence of the marine painter Paul-Jean Clays (1819-1900), his sometimes too colorful palette and the constant repetition of successful themes.Around 1876, Auguste Musin made some timid attempts to break through his image as a marine painter: he showed the salon audience some snow landscapes, which were received less enthusiastically. Musin was simply stuck in the navy box and was supposed by the public to stay there.

Literature: artist lexicons by Thieme/Becker, Benezit and others.

Inscription: antique bronze plaque with the artist‘s dates mounted to the frame.

Technique: oil on wood. Luxuriousy original period gold-plated frame.

Measurements: unframed w 9 7/8" x h 7 7/8" (25 x 20 cm), framed w 17 1/3" h 15 1/3" (44 x 39 cm).

Condition: very good.