Rewind: Gerard Ceunis: The best Hitchin artist you've never heard of

By Layth Yousif

11th Dec 2022 | Local News

REWIND: Hitchin Nub News Rewind feature section is back

Hello and welcome to our occasional Rewind section where we highlight a person or place in our town every week in our Friday newsletter and then over the weekend on our website.

For this week we focus on Gerard Ceunis: The best Hitchin artist you've never heard of

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REWIND: Gerard Ceunis: The best Hitchin artist you've never heard of

The paintings are familiar - images of Hitchin Town centre and Market Place - but the name of the artist may not be: Gerard Ceunis - poet, playwright, philosopher, painter and businessman.

Ceunis (1885 - 1964) was a Belgian émigré artist and writer who lived in Hitchin.

As you can see by his glorious paintings of our town Ceunis was an exceptionally talented artist - but who was he?

Ceunis' Early Years

Ceunis hailed from Ghent in Belgium, with his first professional submission as a painter being at the age of 27, in 1912, at the 'Triennial Salon', shortly after he graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in the town.

However, the First World War put paid to hopes of flourishing as an artist in his homeland.

According to one account, Ceunis was not only a creative presence - but was also said to be a member of the local civil guard - meaning that Germany's invasion of Belgium would result in the artist-cum-militiaman being in grave danger.

The threat of capture by the invading German army in August 1914, prompted he and his wife Alice and their young child Vanna to flee to the safety of England, eventually settling in Hitchin.

A translation of a brief Dutch biography of Ceunis said that: "At the beginning of World War I, as a former member of the vigilante, he fled to England where he made a fortune with a clothing store."

Ceunis in Hitchin

Ceunis along with his wife Alice also ran 'Maison Gerard', a clothes store situated at 7, Market Place (now Starbucks) and lived at an address on Gosmore Road in the 1930s.

Yet, the Belgian artist had his work exhibited in London and also produced at least nine known vibrant paintings of Hitchin, all of which reside at Hitchin's North Herts Museum in Brand Street.

Three of the paintings depict Hitchin market square while a fourth portrays the view from the Market Place towards St Mary's Church. A further pair of paintings share sight of church looking onto the River Hiz, while another is of a tree in Priory Park, near to his home in Gosmore Road.

Ceunis also drew the troubled Hitchin historian Reginald L Hine, who also documented Minsden Chapel, near to where the Rusty Gun pub is now.

Ceunis contributed 26 sketches to Hine's History of Hitchin in the 1938 publication 'The Story of Hitchin Town'. Hine was to commit suicide at Hitchin Railway Station in 1949.

Despite Maison Gerard operating in Market Place well into the 1950s there is a dearth of first hand sources regarding the talented Ceunis' life in Hitchin. Ceunis died in 1964, at the age of 79.

If you have any information about Gerard Ceunis please do get in touch with Hitchin Nub News as we'd love to fill in the gaps of this remarkable and mostly unsung Hitchin artist

SOURCES:

North Herts Museum

The Quest For Ceunis click here for more from Ceunis expert Martin Robb

Gerard Ceunis, 'Hitchin Marketplace' circa 1930. CREDIT: North Hertfordshire Museum

Gerard Ceunis' rendering of St Mary's Church 'Floodlit at Night'. CREDIT: North Hertfordshire Museum

Gerard Ceunis, 'Hitchin Marketplace' circa 1930. CREDIT: North Hertfordshire Museum

Photograph of Hitchin Market Place circa 1950. On the left where the tea rooms stood for years and is now Starbucks is Maison Gerard, the store run, owned and managed by Gerard and Alice Ceunis. CREDIT: Unknown