Jean De Bast

Jean De Bast (Brussels, 1883 – 1975) was a Belgian postage stamp draughtsman and engraver.

Biography

Jean De Bast was born on July 14, 1883, in Brussels, Belgium. In 1907, he joined the National Postage Stamps Printing-house in Mechelen, after having completed his artistic training (drawing, painting, engraving). Moving up, step by step, in the hierarchy, he finished there his career in 1945 as a senior foreman.

His first works in philately are the drawing of the series “Helmeted King” in 1919 and the engraving of King Albert I’s effigy (“Houyoux” type) in 1922.

In 1926, the Belgian sovereigns realized the artist's value, following the issue of a stamp for the benefit of the fight against tuberculosis. In accordance with the wish of the King, a competition was organized between four Prix de Rome and De Bast, who won that competition. Since that time onwards, De Bast became an appointed engraver of the direction of the Postal Services.

While keeping his office at the Postage Stamps Printing-house, De Bast worked as a free engraver, producing works of high quality.

In 1952, he had a disagreement with the direction of the Postal Services, which had retouched the original matrix of a stamp bearing the effigy of King Baudouin without his consent. The stamp issued was so mediocre that it received negative reviews from the press and was rapidly withdrawn from sale.

Being on bad terms with the Postal Service, De Bast waited for several years before being entrusted with another stamp engraving. He put an end to his engraver's career in 1967, at the age of 84. In 1964 and 1965, two of his stamps received a golden medal in Paris: “Infant Christ with John the Baptist and two angels” (after Peter Paul Rubens) and “The daughters of the painter Cornelis De Vos”.

Between 1926 and 1967, he engraved more than one hundred postage stamps, ten or a dozen stamps for the Railways, and 5 fiscal stamps for the Ministry of Finance.

De Bast obtained numerous distinctions both for his work and his behaviour as a patriot during the war. Ten years after his death, on the occasion of the “Journée du timbre” (Stamp's day), the Postal Service paid homage to him by issuing a stamp showing him at work.

Works

All his stamps were printed with the intaglio (also called copperplate printing) process. Since 1959, some of them have been printed using combination of intaglio and rotogravure (also called heliography, screen printing or photogravure) processes.

Belgian postage stamps

Other engraving works relating to Belgian postage stamps:

  • Overprint assigned to be put on the stamps of the first series "Orval", with regard to the laying of the foundation stone of the abbey by Prince Leopold. This overprint shows the monogram L topped by a crown, and bears the date 19-8-29 (19 August 1929).
  • The ornaments figuring on the sheet Koekelberg. The stamp showing the basilica's quire was issued on 1 June 1938. On 21 July, this stamp was republished, in a different colour, on the middle of a sheet bearing:
    • above, an escutcheon sustained by two angels and showing the basilica's front view
    • below, the words VT PATRIA VOTVM PERSOLVAT

Airmail stamps
  • "Aircraft Fokker VII flying over varied towns", 30 April 1930: rotogravure; after a drawing by P. Goblet
  • "DC 4 Skymaster", 23 February 1946: aircraft linking Brussels and Léopoldville; after a drawing by Marcel Cros
  • "Bastogne", 15 June 1946: with extra postage for the benefit of the setting up of a memorial to pay homage to American combatants of Bastogne; after a drawing by S. André

Stamps for Railways and postal packets
  • "Arms of the Kingdom", 1923
  • "General Post Office in Brussels", 25 February 1929
  • "Centenary of Belgian Railways", June 1935: diesel motor-coach, steam-engine
  • "International Railway Congress, in Brussels", 6 July 1939: allegory; after a medal by Godefroid De Vreese
  • "Handicrafts", 11 November 1942: digger, engine-driver, fireman
  • "Signal", 1 August 1942: electric train and signaling
  • "Level crossing", 2 June 1946

Stamps for the Belgian Congo
  • "Airplane flying over a landscape", 22 January 1934: airmail stamps

Projects of stamps not carried or unpublished
  • "Albert I" (1928): this engraving is De Bast's participation to the competition he won against four engravers, Prix de Rome
  • "Albert I" (1934): project carried but not issued, due to the accidental death of the King; engraving assigned to a typographic printing
  • "Protection of black children" (1936): stamp for the Belgian Congo, showing Queen Astrid surrounded with Congolese children; project refused by the Postal Services, who issued 3 stamps very similar, in rotogravure
  • "Prince Charles" (1947): portrait of the Regent, who finally refused the issue of stamps bearing his effigy
  • "King Baudouin wearing glasses" (1953): project to replace the stamp badly retouched by the Postage Stamps Printing-house

Notes and references
  1. (in French) See Rocher Bayard

Further reading
  • Book: Dr Jacques Stes, "Maître Graveur Jean De Bast, sa vie, son œuvre – Meester Graveur Jean De Bast, zijn leven, zijn werk", Collector Club 2005
  • Dr Jacques Stes, "Catalogue raisonné des essais des timbres de Belgique de 1910 à nos jours", Les Editions Williame 2001
  • Dr Jacques Stes, "Belgium Proofs – Essais de Belgique 1849–1949", descriptive catalogue of the proofs of Belgian stamps, published by Musée des Timbres et des Monnaies de Monaco, 2009
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