Jef Van Hoof memorial monument

Collage in memory of Jef Van Hoof at the Jef Van Hoof square.
It was established on June 12, 1960, by the Flemish Tourist Association, in collaboration with the municipal administration. The Boechout architect Armand Segers designed the overall plan, sculptor Staf Van Sintjan and painter George Van Raemdonck, both also from Boechout, created the plaque. Sculptor Albert Poels carved the grand sunken relief, in which he made the synthesis of the master's work.

Jef van Hoof was a composer and conductor. Born on May 8, 1886, in Antwerp. From 1926 he lived on Labistraten or Spokenhof in Boechout. In 1933 he was co-founder of the Flemish National Singing Festival. He died in 1959.

His battle song Groeninghe, with lyrics by Guido Gezelle, was awarded by the General Dutch Association in 1909, and with the cantata Tycho Brahe he won the second Prize of Rome in 1911. In 1916 he became the organist at the St. Michael's Church in Antwerp, and in 1925 he became a harmony teacher at the Carillon School in Mechelen. Other awards followed, such as the Prize from the Province of Antwerp for his First Symphony in A (1957) and the Lodewijk Mortelmans Composition Prize (1958). From 1936 he taught at the Royal Flemish Conservatory in Antwerp, where he served as director from 1942 to 1944.

Leo.Benneke