Eugène Rensburg

Youth and training in The Hague (1872–1900)

Eugenius Rensburg was born in The Hague on 16 September 1872, the son of Jacques Rensburg and Rosalia Hanau. This appears from his marriage record of 1902; the Amsterdam militia register confirms the date of birth. Around 1890 he studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in The Hague in two periods, as recorded by the RKD. The art-trade tradition, based on the RKD and Scheen’s lexicon, adds an evening course at the Quellinusschool in Amsterdam, where he is said to have been a pupil of J. van Delden.

What his early career looked like can mainly be reconstructed from the work itself. In 1897 he painted a harbour scene with a city on the horizon, signed Eug.Rensburg./1897; the canvas was auctioned at Christie’s in 2003. The painting carries a label of a world exhibition in Amsterdam with a silver medal. Which exhibition this concerns remains unresolved: the well-known Amsterdam world exhibition took place in 1895, two years before the painting was made.

Marriage and the Paris years (1900–1915)

On 24 September 1902 Rensburg married Maria Catharina Wilhelmina van Dommelen in Rotterdam; she was born in Utrecht on 16 March 1872. The record gives his profession as draughtsman. The couple subsequently lived abroad for a considerable time. The RKD lists his places of work: The Hague, Amsterdam, Paris, Berlin, Vienna, Frankfurt am Main and Budapest, with motifs along the Rhine, Thames, Danube and Seine and on the Zuiderzee. For Paris the RKD records two periods, 1900-1901 and 1905 to about 1915; the research project Nederlanders in Parijs – Retour de Paris places him in that Hague-Paris generation.

The family’s own chronicle also mentions stays in Liège, London, Marseille and Nice. These are not independently confirmed; only Liège is indirectly supported, by a signed engraving of Maison Havart on the quai de Lacoffe.

The Oedipus etchings of 1913

In the autumn of 1913 Rensburg received his best-documented commission. On 10 September the open-air production of King Oedipus premiered in Arnhem’s Sonsbeek park, with Willem Royaards in the title role and his company Het Tooneel. Rensburg, a friend of the patron Paul Rijkens, drew from life — the plate bears the inscription DEL AD VIV — and delivered a monumental etching carrying the dedication “Dr. Willem Royaards / Openluchtvoorstelling te Arnhem”. Of that plate, a black impression in an edition of 3/5 and a dark-red proof inscribed “Premier état / Unicum” are documented. For the company members a smaller version appeared in an edition of about three hundred, of which an “Épreuve d’artiste” is also recorded. The Hague population register shows that the couple lived in The Hague in 1913.

Rensburg drew from life: the plate of his Oedipus etchings reads DEL AD VIV.

The city he would outlive (1902–1932)

Rensburg registered in Rotterdam on 13 June 1902. The family card records what followed: his occupation shifts from shop manager to painter. For thirty years the couple lived in the city — Weste Wagenstraat 91, Noordblaak 87, Nieuwehaven 33b, and until 26 April 1932 Binnenweg 123b. His wife ran a fashion institute that moved with every address.

From 1908 he drew the old inner city systematically; that year the municipal archive bought the first originals. The Coolsingel in 1912, the Lange Torenstraat in 1910, the Leuvehaven around 1918 — dozens of views of a city that would not survive the bombardment of May 1940. It is precisely that topographical fidelity that later gave his work documentary value. On 26 May 1932 he registered in The Hague, Prinsestraat 24.

Rotterdam family card 1902–1932 · The Hague family card from 1932 (Open Archieven) — evidence level A

Back in The Hague: own editions and gallery rooms (1932–1940)

Around 1932 he self-published the calendar Mooi Holland anno 1933: twelve monthly sheets, lithographed at C. Immig & Zonen, each devoted to a different Dutch city. In November 1934 Vroom & Dreesmann hung a solo of some hundred and forty works, with printing demonstrations in the room; in March of that year he was photographed at the funeral procession of Queen Emma. In 1936 work was shown at Kleykamp.

According to the family he was a member of the Amsterdam society De Onafhankelijken all his working life; what is documented is participation in their exhibitions between 1919 and 1925 and a membership record from 1921. The RKD registers no membership.

HGA 1.04527 (funeral procession 27-03-1934) · exhibition reports, Delpher — evidence level A/B

The city as memory, the family as loss (1940–1945)

When old Rotterdam burned on 14 May 1940, thirty years of drawing changed meaning overnight: what had recorded modernisation became remembrance. That same year De Poort, Fetter, Voorhoeve & Dietrich and Gerzon showed his Rotterdam sheets; at Gerzon in September twenty per cent of proceeds went to the Rotterdam reconstruction fund, and in November a solo of nearly four hundred works — the largest presentation documented of him.

Rensburg came from a Jewish family. His sister Catharina Adler-Rensburg was murdered at Auschwitz on 10 September 1942, his brother Victor at Auschwitz on 14 January 1943, and his brother, the poet Jacques Karel Rensburg, at Sobibór on 7 May 1943. Eugène survived the war and kept drawing: in 1942 a commemorative sheet for the 175-year-old Stakebrand bakery, in 1941 a series of historic prisons for a presentation in Amersfoort, in 1944 the workshop of coppersmith Doll. How he came through these years cannot be established from the sources consulted.

The five Rotterdam exhibitions of 1940 appear with date and source in the chronology on Exhibitions; what was asked for the work at the time is on Market & prices.

Joods Monument · DBNL/Jaap Meijer · exhibition reports 1940–1941, Delpher — evidence level A/B

Final years (1945–1956)

After the war he kept drawing. In 1951 the national Christmas stamps appeared to his design; the last dated drawing we know is a view of the Lange Voorhout from 1955. An anniversary etching for the Grain Merchants’ Committee (1872–1942) is also attached to his name, though the documentation for it is thin.

Eugène Rensburg died on 6 November 1956 in the city of his birth, aged 84. The death certificate records the occupation that had carried him a lifetime: painter.

HGA kl. A 1432 (Lange Voorhout 1955) · death certificate The Hague 1956, no. B2232 — evidence level A