WILLEM PAERELS DUTCH ART OIL PAINTING IMPRESSIONIST

BIOGRAPHY.   Willem Paerels left his native Delft in 1894 for Brussels, embarking upon an artistic career. At first he worked for several interior decorators, while taking courses one day a week at the Brussels Academy. Unable to make ends meet, Paerels returned to his parents in Delft. He went back to Brussels with regained confidence in 1898 and this time managed to pursue his artistic aspirations. When he visited Paris around 1900, he came under the spell of Impressionism and Symbolism. From 1902 onwards, he began to exhibit his work frequently, first in Belgium, later in Paris, Düsseldorf and at the Biennale in Venice. In 1914, his first one-man exhibition was staged at the Georges Giroux gallery in Brussels. The outbreak of World War I took him by surprise while visiting his parents in Scheveningen. He stayed in Holland for the rest of the war, working mainly in and around Scheveningen. After returning to Brussels at the end of 1918 he started travelling extensively. Gradually his work became well known to an ever-increasing circle of especially Belgian collectors and friends. He became a teacher at the Brussels Academy in 1930. His fame spread and he received many official commissions and grants. Paerels died on 10 February 1962 in Paudure, south of Brussels, where he had lived since 1939.