The Fall of the Saints (study), 1932

Although Van den Berghe's surreal work between 1928 and 1939 is thematically very diverse, there are certainly constants to be discerned. Among other things, the theme of flying, floating and falling figures repeatedly recurs as an evocation of the spiritual. Emile Langui, the first biographer of the artist and a close friend, spoke of a compulsion that haunted the artist for years. In The Fall of the Saints, he plunged monks and naked women's bodies into the depths with a vengeful glee. This was his way of denouncing the false appearance of a depraved humanity. The strong movement of the figures and the diagonal composition are reminiscent of the Baroque drama of Rubens' Fall of the Damned. Technically, the canvas bears the traces of Max Ernst's écriture automatique. More than once we asked him, when he was feverishly drawing," writes Langui, "what the thing should be, to which he replied, without a hint of posturing, that he didn't know yet. Other authors point to another common theme in his work, that of the struggle between man and woman. Undeniably, this fascination had autobiographical grounds - Van den Berghe lived separated from his wife and children for a time - and the struggle of the sexes can also be analysed here as a dark undertone of the painting.