The documents related to the realization of the Square de la Place du Petit Sablon can be found in Brussels, Archives Générales du Royaume, Administration des Beaux-arts, remise de 1957, dossiers 491, 492, 493, 494.
A. Van Loo, 'L'haussmannisation de Bruxelles: la construction des boulevards du centre 1865-1880', Revue de l'Art, 106, 1994, pp. 39-49.
For an overview of urban changes in Brussels and Poelaert's work, see R. Vandendaele, Poelaert et son temps, Brussels, Crédit Communal de Belgique, 1880.
See Bulletin de la Ville de Bruxelles, 1876, p. 277.
See P. Loze, 'Jamaer, Pierre Victor', in Vandendaele, as at note 3, pp. 220-21; and Bulletin de la Ville de Bruxelles, 1879, pp. 38-40
P. Derom, J. Van Lennep and C. Leclercq, Les Sculptures de Bruxelles, Brussels, Pandora, 2000, pp. 49-53.
Apart from historical sculpture, the government particularly promoted historical painting. See J. Ogonovzsky-Stefens, La peinture monumentale d'histoire dans les édifces civils en Belgique (1830-1914), Brussels, Académie Royale de Belgique, 1999.
The square was an urban space derived from British models, subsequently implanted and transformed in Paris. L. Limido, L' a r t des jardins sous le Second Empire: Jean-Pierre Barillet-Deschamps, 1824-1873, Seyssel, Champ Vallon, 2002, p. 107.
Beyaert was one of the most important Belgian architects of the nineteenth century. For more information, see J. Victoir and J. Vanderperren, Henri Beyaert, du classicisme à l'Art nouveau, Gand, Éditions de la Dyle, 1992. The Royal Commission for Monuments (Commission Royale des Monuments) was created by King Leopold I in 1835. It promoted the conservation, historic preservation and valorization of heritage. See H. Stynen, De onvoltooid verleden tijd. Een geschiedenis van de monumenten- en landschapszorg in België 1835-1940, Brussels, Stichting Vlaams Erfgoed, 1998.
See Bulletin de la Ville de Bruxelles, as at note 4, p. 38.
See J. De Maeyer (ed.), De Sint-Lucasscholen en de neogotiek 1862-1914, Leuven, KADOC, 1988;
B. Mihail, 'Un mouvement culturel libéral à Bruxelles dans le dernier quart du XIXe siècle, la "néo-Renaissance famande"', Revue belge de philologie et d'histoire, 76, 4, 1998, pp. 978-1020.
Brussels, Archives Générales du Royaume, Administration des Beaux-arts, remise de 1957, Square de la Place du Petit Sablon, Dépenses à charge des budgets ordinaires des exercices 1878 à 1882, r-v, 491.
The firms were Fraigneux, Wouters-Koeckx, Schrijvers, Pieret, Verbogen, Vandenabeele, Devooght and Vermeylen. See Brussels, Archives Générales du Royaume, Administration des Beaux-arts, remise de 1957, Dépenses faites pour l'établissement du square du Petit Sablon, à Bruxelles, r. 494.
See F. Loyer, Paul Hankar, La naissance de l'art nouveau, Brussels, AAM, 1986;
and Sébastien Charlier (ed.), Paul Jaspar architecte (1859-1945), Liège, Commission royale des Monuments, Sites, et Fouilles, 2009.
See L. Van Santvoort, 'De ornamentele beeldhouwkunst van Georges Etienne Houtstont (Parijs, 1832-Sint-Gillis, 1912): de synergie van kunst(ambacht) en architectuur', in Gentse Bijdragen tot de interieurgeschiedenis, Leuven, Peeters, 2012, pp. 1-24.
The German landscape architect Louis Fuchs (1818-1904) settled in Belgium in 1843. In 1861 he was appointed the first urban landscape inspector for the centre of Brussels. See N. de Harlez de Deulin, Parcs et jardins historiques de Wallonie, Namur, IPW, 2008, p. 419.
The Dutch Renaissance architect, painter and engineer Hans Vredeman de Vries (1527-1607) was known for his 1583 publication on garden design, Hortorum viridariorvmque elegantes et multiplices formae - Belles et diverses figures de jardins et de vergers., as well as for his many books on architecture, ornament and perspective. See P. Fuhring (ed.), De wereld is een tuin. Hans Vredeman de Vries en de tuinkunst van de Renaissance, Ghent and Amsterdam, Ludion, 2002.
See V. Vanhamme, Xavier Mellery. L'âme des choses, Amsterdam, Van Gogh Museum, 2000. Mellery was also close to Charles Buls, who had a crucial role in the realization of the Square de la Place du Petit Sablon.
See C. Lemonnier, Histoire des Beaux-arts en Belgique, 1830-1887. Peinture, sculpture, gravure et architecture, Brussels, Weissenbruch, 1887, p. 334.
See 'Résumé des procès-verbaux', Bulletin des commissions royales d'art et archéologie, 1881, pp. 119-20. Mellery's drawings disappeared in the 1960s. It is therefore impossible to evaluate to what extent the sculptors followed his models.
Brussels, Archives Générales du Royaume, Administration des Beaux-arts, remise de 1957, Letter of the Ministry of Internal Afairs to Mellery, 25 October 1883, r. and v., 493.
The list of sculptors and the trades represented can be found in P. Meirsschaut, Les sculptures de plein air à Bruxelles, guide explicatif, Brussels, Bruylant, 1900, pp. 55-58.
Brussels, Archives Générales du Royaume, Administration des Beaux-arts, remise de 1957, Dépenses faites pour l'établissement de la Place du Petit Sablon de Bruxelles, v., 494.
Van Santvoort, as at note 15, pp. 16-17. For the history of the Compagnie des bronzes, see 'La Compagnie des bronzes de Bruxelles, 1 8 5 4 - 1 9 7 9 ', Fabrique d'art, special issue 28-29, 2003.
Derom et al., as at note 6, p. 83.
Archival documents report a problem with the bronze statue made by J. B. Martens, which was delivered without the necessary cuts for the casting process. See Brussels, Archives Générales du Royaume, Administration des Beaux-arts, remise de 1957, letter from Férreol Fourcault to the Ministry of Internal Afairs, 4 August 1882, 492. According to the contract, the Compagnie des bronzes could decide on the number of cuts necessary for the casting of the statues. See Brussels, Archives Générales du Royaume, Administration des Beaux-arts, remise de 1957, Contrat entre le Ministre de l'Intérieur et Mr Forcault, administrateur directeur Générale de la Compagnie des Bronzes, 494
See M. Fransolet, Le sculpteur Paul de Vigne, 1843-1901; étude biographique et catalogue des œuvres, Brussels, Palais des Académies, 1960;
and F. Vandepitte (ed.), Charles Van der Stappen 1843-1910, Brussels, Musée royaux de Beaux-arts de Belgique, 2001.
The issue re-emerged in 1889: an exchange of letters between Beernaert, the Minister of Internal Afairs, and Buls shows concern about the statues' colour, which was considered too white and therefore in prominent contrast with the surrounding vegetation and the bronze statuettes. The minister proposed to disperse the marble statues and install them in diferent city squares, but Buls was frm in his resolve to complete Beyaert's project, and stated that the statues had to be placed in the Square de la Place du Petit Sablon. Brussels, Archives Générales du Royaume, Administration des Beaux-arts, remise de 1957, 491; Beernaert to Buls, 16 February 1889, and Buls to Beernaert, 19 March 1889.
Brussels, Archives Générales du Royaume, Administration des Beaux-arts, remise de 1957, letter from Paul De Vigne to Minister Rolin-Jacquemyns, 17 November 1882, 491.
Brussels, Archives Générales du Royaume, Administration des Beaux-arts, remise de 1957, note written by Rousseau to the Ministry of Internal Afairs, 31 August 1882, 491. With the Commission Royale Belge des Échanges Internationaux, established in 1871, Belgium took part in the international exchange network of reproductions of works of art from diferent countries that had been proposed at the 1867 Paris Exhibition by the Prince of Wales, the future King Edward VII. The reproductions were installed in the Musées Royaux des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels.
See D. Prina, 'Belgian decorative arts in the later nineteenth century. The need for a national museum and debates surrounding didactic collections in Brussels', Journal of the History of Collections, 24, 2, 2011, pp. 257-74.
For the Prix de Rome in Belgium, see C. Dupont, Modèles italiens et traditions nationales. Les artistes belges en Italie (1830-1914), Brussels, IHBR, 2005;
K. Dierckx, 'According to the rules. The Prix de Rome (1918-1921) as a national prestige contest and apogee of academic conventionalism', in J. Pas, E. De Bruyn and N. Dockx (eds), Contradictions - Royal Academy of Fine Arts Antwerp 2013-1663, Gand, MER, 2014, pp. 143-54;
and D. Prina, 'Architectuur-onderwijs aan de antwerpse Academie voor Schone Kunsten, tussen traditie en innovatie (1831-1914)', in Els De Vos and Piet Lombaerde (eds), 350 jaar Architectuur in Antwerpen: van Academie tot Universiteit, Antwerp, Antwerp University Press, 2013, pp. 70-87.
The exchange of letters is in Brussels, Archives Générales du Royaume, Administration des Beaux-arts, remise de 1957, 491.
See, for instance, M. Wasseige, 'Le Petit Sablon: une histoire de la nation', in Art et architecture Publics, Liège, Mardaga, 1999, pp. 103-08.
For the uses of the neo-Renaissance in Belgium in the long nineteenth century, see A. Willis, 'Flemish Renaissance revival in Belgian architecture (1830-1930)', unpub. PhD thesis, Columbia University, 1984.
See P. Lombaerde, 'A la recherche d'une identité historique: l'architecture néo-Renaissance à Anvers au 19ème siècle', in F. Lemerle, Y. Pauwels and A. Thomine Berrada (eds), Le XIXe siècle et l'architecture de la Renaissance, Paris, Picard, 2010, pp. 165-78.
The Belgian elite, on both the Flemish and the Walloon side, spoke French, at that time the unifying language for social and administrative afairs, whereas the working classes mainly spoke one or other Flemish or Walloon dialect of Dutch or French. See E. Gubin, 'L'emploi des langues au XIXème siècle. Les débuts du mouvement famand', in J. Stengers (ed.), Bruxelles, croissance d'une capitale, Brussels, Fonds Mercator, 1979, pp. 235-45. For information on the French intellectual elite, see Mihail, as at note 11.
For a complete overview of Buls' activities, see M. Smets, Charles Buls et les principes de l'art urbain, Liège, Mardaga, 1995; for Buls' defence of the decorative arts, see also D. Prina, 'L'unité des arts avant l'Art Nouveau. La réforme de l'enseignement artistique et industriel dans la deuxième moitié du XIXème siècle en Belgique', unpub. PhD thesis, Politecnico di Torino, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, 2009.
C. Buls, Esthétique des villes, Brussels, Bruylant, 1893.
Smets, as at note 37, p. 127.
A parallel urban project, Annessens Place, planned since 1881 and inaugurated in 1889, presented the same kind of ideological content. For more information, see Derom et al., as at note 6, pp. 80-82.
A. Mabille, Bruxelles, Brussels, Lebègue, 1886, p. 84.
Prina, as at note 37.
Loyer, as at note 14, p. 49.
P. du Colombier, 'Les Quatre Couronnés, patrons des tailleurs de pierre', Comptes rendus des séances de l'Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, 96, 3, 1952, pp. 512-15.
Archives de la Ville de Bruxelles, Fond Buls, École d'art appliqué à établir à Bruxelles, handwritten note, 28.
See École des arts décoratifs. Eléments de l'enseignement. Organisation, Brussels, Mertens, 1879; J. P. Midant, 'La création de l'École des arts décoratifs et l'enseignement de l'architecture à l'Académie des Beaux-arts', in Académie de Bruxelles. Deux siècles d'architecture, Brussels, AAM, 1989, pp. 309-23.
See D. Prina, 'Design in Belgium before Art Nouveau: art, industry, and the reform of artistic education in the second half of the nineteenth century', Journal of Design History, 23, 4, 2010, pp. 329-50.
Brussels, Archives Générales du Royaume, Administration des Beaux-arts, remise de 1957, letter from Buls to the Ministry of Internal Afairs, 12 April 1890, 491.
D. Prina, 'Le Théâtre Flamand de Bruxelles: le progrès en scène', in A. Lechevalier, S. Lucet and J.-Cl. Yon (eds), Les mondes du spectacle - Proceedings of the Conference of the Société des études Romantiques et Dix-neuvièmistes, 2014 (in press, http://etudes-romantiques.ish-lyon. cnrs.fr/congres.html).
J. Janssens, De belgische natie viert: de Belgische nationale feesten, 1830-1914, Leuven, Leuven University Press, 2001, pp. 173-78;
