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this picture and the next three from Lejeune's weblog |
Life and works
Jeannine Lejeune, born on December 27, 1952, in 1994 acquired the stables of a former equestrian center, located along the Chaussee de Huy, at the outskirts of Ouffet in Belgium.
She settled there and in the course of the years she transformed the stables and the surrounding area into an art environment, that she presented as a Musée art brut et naif.
The garden has been decorated with mosaic structures and various bric à brac items.
From the outset it was Jeanine Lejeune's intention to share her art with the people from the village, especially with the children, so that's why she announced her art environment as a museum, open to be visited.
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the corridor/entrance of the museum |
A versatile self-taught artist, Jeanine Lejeune decorated the walls of the corridors and the interior with her paintings, she made all kinds of assemblages and her mosaic structures and sculptures from polyurethane embellish the interior and the garden outside.
In her paintings on the walls Jeanine Lejeune, who sometimes calls herself princess Jeannine du Thier del Creux, she expressed her passions and evoked the dreams she had as a child..
She has said that her house is a realm of dreams and its interior has been described as a baroque universe tinged with mysticism.
Deeply religious and endowed with a strong sense of mystic, Jeannine has embellished the walls with scenes of angels, Adam and Eve in the paradise and the seven deadly sins.
Deeply religious and endowed with a strong sense of mystic, Jeannine has embellished the walls with scenes of angels, Adam and Eve in the paradise and the seven deadly sins.
The garden has been decorated with mosaic structures and various bric à brac items.
From the outset it was Jeanine Lejeune's intention to share her art with the people from the village, especially with the children, so that's why she announced her art environment as a museum, open to be visited.
Jeanine herself however liked to stay at home and she would not frequent Ouffet's public facilities, so as far as I understand her art environment did not enjoy so much the interest of the villagers. It was more often visited by lovers of outsider art from further afield.
Discussing the future of the site
In 2010 on the initiative of the Faculty of Architecture of the University of Liège and the MAD Musée in that city a committee was formed to study the best way to ascertain the future of the site. One of the reasons to do this was that using the buildings as a place of living and a museum had been done without any authorization of the local authorities and did not fit in the community's land use plan, an issue which had to be resolved.
The committee worked enthusiastically for some eighteen months, but ultimately a solution was not found, since Lejeune could not accept the legal construction stating that for a symbolic sum she would sell the site to a foundation (that would ensure its future) in exchange for a continuous usufruct.
The various aspects of this issue have been discussed in an article by Brigitte van den Bossche in the Rivista dell' Osservatorio Outsider Art (see documentation).
In May 2015 Jeanine Lejeune published a message on her weblog saying that the museum was for sale (musée à vendre), but the sale probably has not been realized. In September 2017 the regional journal l'Avenir published an interview with Lejeune about her artistic activities (text almost fully behind a paywall), while the same journal also in also in September 2017 reported that in cooperation with Lejeune a pony club could use the grounds where the Maison-Musée is located.
All this indicates that in 2017 Jeannine Lejeune still lived in the former stables.
Discussing the future of the site
In 2010 on the initiative of the Faculty of Architecture of the University of Liège and the MAD Musée in that city a committee was formed to study the best way to ascertain the future of the site. One of the reasons to do this was that using the buildings as a place of living and a museum had been done without any authorization of the local authorities and did not fit in the community's land use plan, an issue which had to be resolved.
The committee worked enthusiastically for some eighteen months, but ultimately a solution was not found, since Lejeune could not accept the legal construction stating that for a symbolic sum she would sell the site to a foundation (that would ensure its future) in exchange for a continuous usufruct.
The various aspects of this issue have been discussed in an article by Brigitte van den Bossche in the Rivista dell' Osservatorio Outsider Art (see documentation).
In May 2015 Jeanine Lejeune published a message on her weblog saying that the museum was for sale (musée à vendre), but the sale probably has not been realized. In September 2017 the regional journal l'Avenir published an interview with Lejeune about her artistic activities (text almost fully behind a paywall), while the same journal also in also in September 2017 reported that in cooperation with Lejeune a pony club could use the grounds where the Maison-Musée is located.
All this indicates that in 2017 Jeannine Lejeune still lived in the former stables.
However, on December 1, 2020 the website C-Paje published an article about the art of Jeannine Lejeune, in which it was also noted that they had not been able to get in touch with her. Early 2023 there was no information about Jeannine Lejeune and her art environment available on the internet.
Documentation
Documentation
* Article (August 2005) by Frédérique Siecard in Belgian newspaper La Soirn (behind a paywall)
* Jeanine Lejeune's weblog (2005)
* Brigitte van den Bossche, "La tutela difficile. Il caso di Jeannine Lejeune", in: Rivista dell' Osservatorio Outsider Art, nr 5 (October 2012)
Video
* Video entitled Artiste Élément Terre by Benoît Baptiste and Jean-Marc Lelaboureur (19'13", Vimeo, uploaded 2010)
* Video entitled Artiste Élément Terre by Benoît Baptiste and Jean-Marc Lelaboureur (19'13", Vimeo, uploaded 2010)
first published November 2014, last revised March 2023
Jeannine Lejeune
Jeannine Lejeune
Musée art brut et naif
Chaussée de Huy
Ouffet, Belgium
actual status of the site unknown
actual status of the site unknown
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