Laurent Delvaux was a prolific Belgian sculptor.

Life

Delvaux was born in Ghent

Ghent

Ghent is a city and a municipality located in the Flemish region of Belgium. It is the capital and biggest city of the East Flanders province. The city started as a settlement at the confluence of the Rivers Scheldt and Lys and in the Middle Ages became one of the largest and richest cities of...

. In Brussels

Brussels

Brussels , officially the Brussels Region or Brussels-Capital Region , is the capital of Belgium and the de facto capital of the European Union...

 he was a student of Denis Plumier from Antwerp, he followed Plumier to London in 1719 and collaborated with him on the funerary monument of John Sheffield, duke of Buckingham

John Sheffield, 1st Duke of Buckingham and Normanby

John Sheffield, 1st Duke of Buckingham and Normanby, KG, PC , was a poet and notable Tory politician of the late Stuart period, who served as Lord Privy Seal and Lord President of the Council.-Career:...

 (1721-22, London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

, Westminster Abbey

Westminster Abbey

The Collegiate Church of St Peter at Westminster, popularly known as Westminster Abbey, is a large, mainly Gothic church, in the City of Westminster, London, United Kingdom, located just to the west of the Palace of Westminster. It is the traditional place of coronation and burial site for English,...

). After an international career in London (1717-26) then Rome (1728-32) he settled in Nivelles

Nivelles

Nivelles is a Walloon city and municipality located in the Belgian province of Walloon Brabant. The Nivelles municipality includes the old communes of Baulers, Bornival, Thines, and Monstreux....

, where he died. Like Antoine Cardon

Antoine Cardon

Antoine-Alexandre-Joseph Cardon , also known as Cardon the elder to distinguish him from his son, was a Belgian painter, portraitist and engraver, born an Austrian due to Brussels then being in the Austrian Netherlands...

 and Antoine Brice

Antoine Brice

Antoine Brice was a Belgian painter.- Life :Antoine Brice was the son of the painter Pierre-François Brice, working in the entourage of Prince Charles Alexander of Lorraine, and his own son Ignace also became a painter...

, he was a protégé of Charles de Lorraine, governor general of the Austrian Netherlands. He also worked for other European courts such as that of Portugal

Portugal

Portugal , officially the Portuguese Republic is a country situated in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of Europe, and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the West and South and by Spain to the North and East. The Atlantic archipelagos of the...

 and for major abbeys like those at Afflighem, Floreffe

Floreffe Abbey

Floreffe Abbey is a former Premonstratensian monastery, the second of the order to be founded, situated on the Sambre at Floreffe, about 11 km southwest of Namur, Belgium.-History:...

 and Villers

Villers Abbey

Villers Abbey is an ancient Cistercian abbey located near the town of Villers-la-Ville in the Brabant province of Wallonia , one piece of the Wallonia's Major Heritage. Founded in 1146, the abbey was abandoned in 1796...

. Many Belgian churches and museums in Brussels and Ghent have works by him.

Among Delvaux's students was the sculptor Gilles-Lambert Godecharle

Gilles-Lambert Godecharle

Gilles-Lambert Godecharle was a Belgian sculptor, a pupil of Laurent Delvaux, "the only sculptor of international repute in Delvaux's retinue", who became one of two outstanding representatives of Neoclassicism in the Austrian Netherlands.In response to his early promise, empress Maria Theresa...

. Delvaux's grandson Édouard Delvaux

Édouard Delvaux

Édouard Delvaux was a Belgian Romantic painter. The grandson of the sculptor Laurent Delvaux and apprentice of the painter Henri Van Assche, his work mainly consisted of bucolic rural scenes from his many trips to France, Switzerland, Germany and Italy...

 (1806-1862) was a rural painter and a student of Henri Van Assche

Henri Van Assche

Henri van Assche, born at Brussels in 1774, showed from his earliest years a predilection for painting, and received from his father, who was a distinguished amateur artist, the first principles of design and perspective. He was afterwards placed with Deroy of Brussels, from whom he received...

(1774-1841).