Born into a skipper’s family, Alfred Ost developed his artistic talents after his family settled in Mechelen. His early work featured images from daily rural life, notably including horses and processions. During the First World War, Ost fled to the neutral Netherlands, where he developed his lithography skills. Returning to the Antwerp suburb of Borgerhout after the war, his works depicted more serious and emotional topics. Ost also worked as a primary school art teacher for many years. As the Second World War broke out, he moved in with colleagues in Borgerhout and Brasschaat, where he decorated the walls with immense charcoal drawings. Shortly after the end of the war, he died of cancer, which was complicated by pneumonia. Much of his work was donated to the Antwerp Zoological Society, where Ost had regularly displayed his works.
The motif of Ost’s poster “De Voetballer” dates back to 1910. It is said to have been influenced by a match between Northern Nomads, a team from the area between Manchester and Liverpool, and Belgium’s Union Saint-Gilloise, which the English team won 2-0 in the final of an international tournament in Bruxelles. The colors of the jersey relate to the red and white of the Northern Nomads. The size of the lithograph is approximately 87 x 123 cm. One print is exhibited in the Belgian sports museum Sportimonium.
Belgium