Recently Ray Harris made a post on his Novel Activist blog about Dutch painter Marcel von Sijben de Maroye and I liked his style, inspiring my to research him further.  As I did, I encountered another painter with the same last name, Edmond von Sijben de Maroye.  Initially I thought they may have been the same painter; it is not unusual for European artists, who frequently have four or five names rather than the currently customary three, to be listed under more than one combination of their name.  But I happened across a site that had work by both artists, and it gave birth and death dates for both.  Edmond and Marcel were born in 1876 and 1878 respectively, and if I had to guess, I would place them as siblings, owing to the nigh identical Impressionistic style of their work and the very close birth dates.  The trouble is, there is virtually nothing on the internet about either one—not in English anyway.  So, I’m going to put my (rather negligible) reputation on the line and just say outright that they were brothers.  If anyone else has additional information to support or contradict this, I would welcome it.  Although I was only able to pin down the date on of them, I’m fairly certain all of these works were painted in the early part of the 20th century.

[Editorial update, 2016/06/01: Indeed, Edmond (1876–1970) and Marcel (1878–1962) von Sijben are brothers.]

This first piece is Neoclassical in tone, if not in technique.  It is an idyll, which is a kind of allegory of paradise.  Note the filmy, translucent clothing of the boy and girl at right.

Edmond von Sijben de Maroye – Mother and Children in a Field

Edmond von Sijben de Maroye – Two Children in a Meadow

Marcel von Sijben de Maroye – Girl in a Charleston Dress (Portrait of Princess Juliana) (1927)

Marcel von Sijben de Maroye – Nude Girl

Marcel von Sijben de Maroye – Nude Child