Around fifteen years ago the author came across two large paintings of the painter Jean Baptiste Discart (Modena 1855 – Paris, 1940) in the drawing room of Wielbergen House, Angerlo. These paintings were signed J.B. Discart, 1903 but very little information about the painter and about these portraits could be found. Later it was discovered that Discart had painted six members of the Brantsen family and that the painter of orientalist paintings in Tangier and the Dutch portraits were the same. In the municipal archive in The Hague many entries from Tangier and his registration in The Hague and the other way round could be find.
Research and findings in archives in The Hague, Amsterdam, Arnhem, Paris, Brussels, Tangier, Würzburg, Vienna, London and Modena and in the archives of auction houses resulted in a book about the painter Discart which was published in 2019 year at Van Gruting Publishers, Utrecht. On June 25 2019 the book was launched at a book presentation in the residence of the Austrian Ambasssador to the Netherlands in The Hague. The flyer (in the Dutch language) made for the book presentation in 2019 is included to peruse.
The Dutch cultural foundations that made the Dutch book possible largely offered the facilities to have the book translated and published in the English language.
At the end of August 2020 the expanded English edition of the book will appear as a hardcover, also at Van Gruting Publishers, Utrecht. The upcoming book will count around 220 pages and will contain more than 40 orientalist paintings and 60 Dutch portraits and drawings by Discart. The book cover is included.
Apart from painters of Dutch origin at the time Jean Baptiste Discart has painted more members of the Dutch elite in his lifetime than any other foreign painter at the time.
In the book several new finding results: orientalist paintings and drawings as well as portraits have been included.
Stichting schilder Jean Baptiste Discart 