Hendrik Frans Schaefels

Hendrik Frans Schaefels or Henri François Schaefels, also known as Rik Schaefels and Henri François Schaefels (Antwerp, 2 December 1827 – Antwerp, 9 June 1904) was a Belgian Romantic painter, draughtsman and engraver known for his seascapes, cityscapes, genre paintings, landscapes with figures and history paintings. He worked in the Romantic style popular in Belgium in the mid nineteenth century and was highly esteemed in Europe for his representations of historic naval battles.

Hendrik Frans Schaefels was the son of Hendrik Raphael Schaefels, a decorative painter working in a Neo-Classical style and a teacher of decorative design at the Antwerp Academy. His older brother Lucas Victor Schaefels (1824-1885) became a successful still life painter and draughtsman and a teacher at the Antwerp Academy.

Hendrik Frans Schaefels began as a student at the Antwerp Academy of landscape painter Jan Baptiste de Jonghe and landscape and marine painter Jacob Jacobs. After leaving the Academy he worked between his 15th and 17th year at the studio of Jan Michiel Ruyten, a painter of cityscapes, Ruyten's work would leave an important mark on Schaefels' own cityscapes. A seascape by Schaefel was accepted at the tri-annual salon of Antwerp when the artist was only 17 years old.

Schaefels spent his entire career in Antwerp. He was friends with leading Antwerp artists and intellectuals such as Hendrik Conscience, Jan Lambrecht Domien Sleeckx, Max Rooses, Frans Van Kuyck and Peter Benoit. Schaefels was a member of the association 'Artibus Patriae', which was founded in 1865 with the goal of supporting new acquisitions by the museums in Antwerp. He was for a time engaged in local politics for the Catholic Party. From 1869 to 1872 he had a seat on the Antwerp city council where he represented the interests of artists and art promotion in general.

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