Delville, Jean
(1867-1953). Poet, artist and first General Secretary of the Belgian Section, 1911-13. Born July 10, 1867, in Louvain, Belgium, his school career was not a success as he could not tolerate the dull routine of study. At the age of fifteen he persuaded his parents to allow him to enter the School of Arts at Brussels. After but two years of study Delville was awarded prizes for composition, painting and drawing from life. A period in Paris brought Delville to the attention of the art world. When his Head of Orpheus was exhibited, a French critic wrote, “If someone had announced this picture as a newly discovered antique painting, the Government would have covered the work with gold. Unfortunately it is only a poor Belgian artist who has painted this marvel.” In 1895 Delville won the Grand Prix de Rome with his picture, Christ Glorified by the Children.
1905 saw Delville back in Brussels and in that year he met the composer Alexander SCRIABIN and Delville introduced him to Helena P. BLAVATSKY’S The Secret Doctrine and challenged him to compose music on the themes in that work.
Publications include:
The Haunted Horizon; The Shudder of the Sphinx; The Unknown Splendors.
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