From shadow catalogue to commercial art. Servranckx’s works in avant-garde magazines (1920-1930)

Victor Servranckx, one of the most important artists of the Flemish modernist movement of the years 1914-1930, enjoyed international reception in the avant-garde press of the time. Magazines such as Noi, L’Esprit nouveau, the Bulletin de l’Effort moderne or Der Sturm reproduced his works and some of them are not recorded in his catalog. This “forgotten gallery” is reconstructed in the context of the evolution of abstract or geometric art and in relation to major events such as the Second Congress of Modern Arts held in Antwerp in 1922, the Prima Mostra internazionale di arte decorative di Monza in 1923, the Exposition internationale des arts décoratifs et industriels modernes of Paris in 1925 or the International Exhibition of Modern Art organized in New York by the Société Anonyme in 1926-1927. This “gallery” shows how Servranckx, initially considered as Marinetti’s most advanced Belgian follower, soon asserted notably against Picasso, with whom he was in direct relationship, a “pure” art detached from any figuration. But the path to success opened up in the USA and Eastern Europe, since 1925, by magazines such as The Arts, The Brooklyn Museum Quarterly or the Ukrainian Nova generatsiia aroused the desire for greater profitability in his production, which oriented him, like other contemporary Belgian modernists, towards applied arts. His previous commitment to collective art could find there the justification for a mass artistic diffusion such as conceived by Edward Bernays in his famous book Propaganda (1928).