BUSTE ALBERT BRUGGEMAN | Kunst in de Stad

BUSTE ALBERT BRUGGEMAN (WERNER HEYNDRICKX)

(1872-1960). He was married to Marie Peleman (1871-1960) and was the father of three children: Louis, Paula and Albert Jr.

He is referred to as an “industrious man,” which in Sint-Niklaas means he was a manufacturer. His firm “Tissage de Tapis et d'Ameublement Bruggeman” had initially started small in the Walburgstraat before moving permanently to the Lamstraat. There the company went on to grow into a renowned carpet weaving company that could focus on worldwide exports.

According to his grandson, Danny Bruggeman, Albert senior had a strong personality and conviction that sometimes made him seem immovable. Yet he was also always the pater familias with great support and care for his two brothers and three sisters: someone everyone could turn to, not only for advice but also for actual help.

As an employer, he contributed in his own way to the well-being of the workers by significantly improving working conditions.

Around WWII, the period in which the bust was made, he also sat on the “Workers' Councils”, where disputes between employers and employees were resolved in as neutral a manner as possible.

Werner Heyndrickx's busts would have been made between 1935 and 1945. By then Albert Bruggeman was over 60. Still, you notice the undiminished vigour emanating from this person: someone with a determination, but also with a certain mildness. Strict, but just. Or as the image suggests: a man in one piece.

Thanks to grandson Danny Bruggeman for the info

HEYNDRICKX Werner (1909-1986)

Werner Heyndrickx was a sculptor of portraits and figures. His father, Jozef Heyndrickx, was a stonemason. Education at the academies of Sint-Niklaas and Antwerp and at the National Institute of Fine Arts in Antwerp (studio of E. Wijnants). Teacher of sculpture at the Municipal Academy of Fine Arts in Sint-Niklaas and the Higher Institute in Antwerp

His workshop was situated near the Tereken cemetery in Sint-Niklaas. For bronze casting he always worked with Achiel Vindevogel in Zwijnaarde. He attached major attention to the patina of a statue.

Particularly in Werner Heyndrickx's early works one can still clearly sense the influence of his teachers Arthur Dupon and especially Ernest Wijnants: in the monumentality and in the reduction of an image to a number of stylized surfaces . This rather synthesizing style is recognisable in the sculptures of the apostles he made for the church of ‘Kristus Koning’ in Sint-Niklaas. Even though heads, hands and feet have been executed with precision and detail, the vertical folds are stylised. The same approach can be seen in the sculptures ‘Contemplatie’ and ‘Familie’.

Werner Heyndrickx’s portraits exhale sharp observation. They are the result of a relentless search for an accurate resemblance and for the subject’s character.

He took part in many exhibitions in Belgium and abroad: Antwerp, Ghent, Liège, Namur, Paris, Prague and Bratislava. Prizes : the 'Godecharle Prize', the 'Van Lerius Prize', the 'Doutrolon de Try Prize' and the 'Prize of the Province of East Flanders for Sculpture'.

Kunst in de Stad displays some fifteen works by this sculptor.