After starting a degree course at the Academie voor Industriële Vormgeving in 1964 Eugène Peters left in 1968 after being offered an internship at Royal Sphinx, a designer and manufacturer of toilet bowls and other ceramic items.

While there, a fellow artist, Cornelis Le Mair, recommended he should move to Antwerp, where he went on to study graphic design at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts from 1968 to 1971.

Many creatures in his paintings seem nevertheless to have stepped straight out of a Hieronymus Bosch landscape, while he has also drawn inspiration from artists such as Pieter Breughel the Elder and, to take a more contemporary example, Pyke Koch.

The influence of Fantastic Realism on his work can be seen in his meticulously painted animals, with their coats fringed with exquisite fur or lace collars, or kitted out with all sorts of strange weaponry, ranging from a lance or spear to a burnt matchstick.

As well as Towers of Babylon, his works regularly feature Pierrot, Harlequin and other characters from the Commedia dell'arte, as well as imaginary and real cities such as Antwerp and Turnhout.