[5] Despite his talents as a painter, he is now mainly known for his poster designs and postcards as well as his First World War drawings expressing his hatred for the German occupiers.

He was appointed professor of art history at the Université Nouvelle (New University, later renamed 'Institut des Hautes Études de Belgique' (Institute of High Studies of Belgium)) in 1905 where he replaced Paul Janson as member of the Steering Committee.

[7] He was influenced by the work of the Belgian artistic and literary group known as Les XX, one of Europe's most prominent avant-garde circles and a catalyst for the development of Symbolism and Art Nouveau.

Combaz was first introduced to Oriental art by the Belgian Indologist and scholar of Buddhist Studies Louis de La Vallée-Poussin.

[7] Gisbert Combaz was a versatile personality who combined a variety of artistic pursuits with scholarly studies and academic education.

[1] He was talented painter whose works show the inspiration of Maurice Denis who also directed him towards religious subjects.

Aside from encouraging consumption, it evoked moments of pleasure and lightness that were part of the leisure and entertainment of the affluent and influential population.

[10] Combaz was very effective in transposing the Japanese wood block print style known as ukiyo-e to the medium of posters.

With the motif of the sailboat treated in a single flat color, his poster gains a great expressiveness equal to that of Japanese prints.

Combaz wrote in the journal L'Art moderne that the quality of the Japanese landscapes is their chromatic unity: in each print there is a dominant palette which, by simplifying the impression, makes it strong and confers to these pictures a character of powerful homogeneity.

He then developed towards a cloisonne style of patterned images - birds, figures, land and seascapes - enclosed by a thick dark line.

He further created a number of drawings that expressed the horror of the Belgians at the atrocities committed by the German occupiers during the First World War.

Combaz depicted in very graphic detail the horrified people fleeing the town with flames visible in the background of the drawing.

[4] In the 1930s, along with René Grousset, Henri Maspero and Paul Pelliot, he published a number of publications on oriental art.