Augustin Coppens
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Augustin Coppens or Aurelius Augustinus Coppens (9 March 1668, in Brussels – 31 August 1740, in Brussels) was a Flemish painter, engraver, draughtsman and tapestry designer active in Brussels, which was first part of the Spanish Netherlands and later the Austrian Netherlands. He specialized in landscape and city views. He is now mainly known for his tapestry designs and for his drawings and prints documenting the devastating effect on the civil buildings caused by the Bombardment of Brussels by French troops in 1695.[1][2]
Augustin Coppens was born as the youngest son of the landscape painter Frans Coppens in Brussels where he was baptized on 9 March 1668.[1] He is believed to have trained with Jean François Millet (I).[2][3]
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On 13, 14 and 15 August 1695 French troops carried out the first artillery bombardment on a civil population in modern history. This event, known as the Bombardment of Brussels, caused the destruction of a third of the buildings in Brussels. Augustin Coppens' home was also destroyed. Coppens took to the streets of Brussels and documented the horrible destruction of his hometown. He engraved 12 of the drawings, some with the help of his friend Richard van Orley. The plates were published the same year in Brussels under the title Perspectives des Ruines de la Ville de Bruxelles. The publication was widely circulated and assured Coppens' fame. The prints were also reproduced in different sizes and colors by the German engraver Peter Schenk the Elder in Amsterdam. The prints have an important documentary value by providing a record of the impact of the bombardment.[4] Seven further plates from Coppens' drawings were engraved by the Brussels engraver Jan Lauwryn Krafft and published in 1715.[5] A portrait painting of Coppens showing him standing with a paper roll and his brushes before a landscape with the ruins of Brussels was for a long time regarded as his self-portrait but is now believed to be by an unknown hand.[4]
Augustin Coppens joined the Brussels Guild of Saint Luke in 1698 when he was already 30 years old. By his account he had already commenced designing tapestries and cartoons before he joined the Guild. He was very productive as a tapestry designer working on commissions from workshops in Brussels, Antwerp and Oudenaarde.[1]
