Jules Schmalzigaug

Returning to Antwerp, he became a secretary to the art society of Kunst van Heden/L'Art Contemporain, and worked on the organisation of international exhibitions.

He was declared unfit for military service on health grounds; after the start of World War I, he moved to The Hague in neutral Netherlands.

He felt lonely in the isolated country; he longed for the sunny Venice and the whirring international life of artists.

In his art he returned to figurative painting, but his works from this period did not reach the previous level of success.

The British art historian Michael Palmer has written that Schmalzigaug has not received great acknowledgement in his life neither in Belgium, nor internationally, but in spite of this he belonged to the most original and most talented modern Belgian artists of his time.