List of people from Brussels

This is a list of notable people from Brussels.

Patroness of Brussels

• Saint Gudulae of Brussels and Eibingen, Saint of the city and national saint of Belgium

Political leaders in Brussels

The Belgian Monarchs

Main article: List of Belgian monarchs

The Belgian Monarchs reside in Brussels, the capital of Belgium. They were all born in Brussels (except for Leopold I).

• Leopold I (1790–1865), the first King of the Belgians
• Leopold II (1835–1909), the second King of the Belgians
• Albert I (1875–1934), the third King of the Belgians
• Leopold III (1901–1983), the fourth King of the Belgians
• Baudouin (1930–1993), the fifth King of the Belgians
• Albert II (born 1934; abdicated 2013), the sixth King of the Belgians
• Philippe (born 1960), the seventh King of the Belgians

Minister-Presidents of Brussels

Main article: Minister-President of the Brussels-Capital Region

• Charles Picqué (P.S.) (1989–1999)
• Jacques Simonet (M.R.) (1999–2000)
• François-Xavier de Donnéa (M.R.) (2000–2003)
• Daniel Ducarme (M.R.) (2003–2004)
• Jacques Simonet (M.R.) (2004) (replaced Daniel Ducarme who resigned)
• Charles Picqué (P.S.) (2004–2013)
• Rudi Vervoort (P.S.) (2013–present)

Governors of Brussels

Main article: Governor of Brussels-Capital

• André Degroeve (1995–1998)
• Raymonde Dury (1998) (resigned)
• Véronique Paulus de Châtelet (1998)

Mayors of Brussels

Main article: List of mayors of the City of Brussels

• Joseph Van De Meulebroeck (lib.) (1939–1956)
• Lucien Cooremans (lib.) (1956–1975)
• Pierre Van Halteren (lib.) (1975–1982)
• Hervé Brouhon (P.S.) (1977–1983)
• Freddy Thielemans (P.S.) (1983–1988)
• Michel Demaret (PSC, now CdH) 1989–1994)
• François-Xavier de Donnéa (M.R.) (1995–2000)
• Freddy Thielemans (P.S.) (2001)

Born in Brussels

Following notable people were born in the area today known as the Brussels-Capital Region.

Royals

• Mary of Burgundy (1457–1482), Duchess of Burgundy from 1477–1482
• Charles VII (1697–1745), Holy Roman Emperor
• Charles Eugene (1728–1793), Duke of Württemberg
• Princess Joséphine-Charlotte of Belgium (1927–2005), Grand Duchess of Luxembourg
• Princess Luisa Maria at Clinique Saint Jean in 1995
• Princess Laetitia Maria at Clinique Saint Jean in 2003

Politicians

• Paul Deschanel (1855–1922), president of France (1920)
• Antoine Duquesne (1941–2010), Belgian MP and Senator, Member of the European Parliament
• Pierre Harmel (1911–2009), Prime Minister of Belgium (1965–1966)
• Marie Janson (1873–1960), politician
• Paul-Emile Janson (1872–1944), Prime Minister of Belgium (1937–1938)
• Philippe Lamberts (born 1963), politician
• Adolphe Max (1869–1939), politician and Mayor of Brussels from 1909 until 1939
• Annemie Neyts (born 1944), politician, former president of the Liberal International, president of the European Liberal Democrat and Reform Party
• Charles-Ferdinand Nothomb (1936–2023), politician
• Étienne Pinte, French MP and mayor of Versailles
• Paul-Henri Spaak (1899–1972), Prime Minister of Belgium (1938–1939, 1946 and 1947–1949), President of the United Nations General Assembly (1946–1957), Secretary-General of NATO (1957–1961)
• Emile Vandervelde (1866–1938), President from 1900 of the Second International

Artists

Cinema

• Chantal Akerman (1950–2015), filmmaker and director
• Patrick Bauchau (born 1938), actor
• Gérard Corbiau (born 1941), film director
• Thierry De Mey (born 1956), film director and composer
• Jacques Feyder (1885–1948), screenwriter and international film director, one of the founders of poetic realism in French cinema
• Fernand Gravey (1904–1970), also known as Fernand Gravet, film actor
• Audrey Hepburn (1929–1993), Anglo-Dutch actress, fashion model, and humanitarian
• Helena Noguerra (born 1969), actress, singer and television presenter
• Raymond Rouleau (1904–1981), actor and film director
• Jean-Claude Van Damme (born 1960), actor, nicknamed "The Muscles from Brussels"
• Jaco Van Dormael (born 1957 in Ixelles), film director
• Alexandra Vandernoot (born 1965), actress
• Agnès Varda (1928–2019), French film director

Performance / dance

• Akarova (Marguerite Acarin, 1904–1991), dancer, choreographer and artist
• Jan De Cock (born 1976), visual artist
• Clémentine de Vère (1888–1973), magician and illusionist
• Hilda Madsen (1910–1981), British-American artist and dog breeder

Music

• Stromae (Paul van Haver) (born 1985) musician
• Plastic Bertrand (Roger Jouret) (born 1958), rock musician
• Jacques Brel (1929–1978), singer-songwriter and actor
• Jean-Luc De Meyer (born 1963), musician, lead singer of Front 242
• Lara Fabian (born Lara Crokaert, 1970), singer
• Richard Jonckheere (born 1965), musician, member of Front 242
• Magali Luyten (born 1978), singer
• Victor-Charles Mahillon (1841–1924), musician and writer on musical topics
• Brian Molko (born 1972), songwriter, lead vocalist and guitarist of the band Placebo
• Pierre Rapsat (1948–2002), singer and musician
• The Singing Nun (Jeanine Deckers) (1933–1985), member of a Dominican Convent, famous for her song "Dominique"
• Edna Stern (born 1977), pianist
• Toots Thielemans (1922–2016), jazz musician
• Tonia (born Arlette Antoine Dominicus, 1947), singer
• Angèle Van Laeken (born 1995), singer-songwriter
• Ghalia Volt, blues rock musician and songwriter
• Régine Zylberberg (1929–2022), pioneer of the modern nightclub
• Penelope Antena (born 1987), musician

Painting / sculpture / architecture / other

• Pierre Alechinsky (born 1927), artist
• Richard Aurili, (1864- 1943), sculptor
• Colijn de Coter (c. 1446–1538), Renaissance painter
• Lodewijk de Vadder (1605–1655), landscape painter
• Francois Duquesnoy (1597–1643), sculptor
• Alfred Jonniaux (1882–1974), portrait painter
• Constantin Meunier (1831, Etterbeek –1905), painter and sculptor
• Joseph Noiret (1927–2012), painter, writer and poet
• Joseph Poelaert (1817–1879), architect, author of the Palais de Justice
• Hugo Puttaert (born 1960), graphic designer
• Paul Saintenoy (1862–1952), architect
• Jean Henri Simon (1752–1834), engraver and soldier
• Jean Stevo (1914–1974), painter and engraver
• Arnt van der Dussen, medieval tapestry maker
• Juliette Wytsman (1866–1925), painter
• Sophie Alouf-Bertot (b. 1945), painter and graphic designer

Fashion

• Liz Claiborne (1929–2007), fashion designer
• Diane von Fürstenberg (born 1946), Belgian-American fashion designer
• Stella Maxwell (born 1990), Belgian born British fashion model

Literature / cartoon

• Julio Cortázar (1914–1984), Argentine novelist and poet
• Jacques Danois (1927–2008), actor, journalist, writer
• Michel De Ghelderode (1898–1962), dramatist
• André Fontainas (1865–1948), Symbolist poet and critic
• André Franquin (1924–1997), cartoonist
• Jacqueline Harpman (1929–2012), novelist
• Hergé (Georges Remi) (1907–1983), Belgian cartoonist, creator of The Adventures of Tintin
• Edgar P. Jacobs (1904–1987), comics writer, created the series that made him famous, Blake and Mortimer
• Auguste Jouhaud (1805–1888), writer and playwright
• Camille Lemonnier (1844–1913), writer
• Pierre Mertens (born 1939), writer, director of the Centre de sociologie de la littérature at the Université Libre de Bruxelles
• Henri Horace Meyer (1801–1870), French dramatist and novelist
• Jeanine Moulin (1912–1998), poet and literary scholar
• Paul Nougé (1895–1967), surrealist poet and philosopher
• Hubert Nyssen (1925–2011), Belgian-French writer
• Peyo (Pierre Culliford) (1928–1992), illustrator and creator of the Smurfs
• Edmond Picard (1836–1924), jurist and writer
• François Schuiten (born 1956), comics artist
• Benoît Sokal (1954–2021), Belgian comic artist and video game developer
• Charles Spaak (1903–1975), screenwriter
• Philippe Tome (Philippe Vandevelde), (1957–2019), comic strip writer
• Jean-Philippe Toussaint (born 1957), writer, Prix Médicis 2005
• Jean Van Hamme (born 1939), novelist and scenario writer of comic books
• Geert van Istendael (born 1947 in Uccle), writer
• François Weyergans (1941–2019), writer, Prix Goncourt 2005
• Marguerite Yourcenar (1903–1987), French writer and first female member of the Académie française

Scientists

• Jean-Jacques Cassiman (born 1943 in Sint-Jans-Molenbeek, died 2022), researcher and professor of human genetics
• François d'Aguilon or Aguilonius (1546–1617), mathematician and physicist
• Pierre Deligne (born 1944), mathematician
• François Englert, Nobel Prize in Physics 2013
• Robert Goldschmidt (1877–1935), chemist and physician
• Éliane Gubin (born 1942), Belgian historian, researcher and professor
• Friedrich Moritz Hartogs (1874–1943), German-Jewish mathematician
• Jean Jeener (born 1931), physical chemist and physicist
• Claude Lévi-Strauss (1908–2009), French anthropologist
• Joseph Plateau (1801–1883), physicist; invented an early stroboscopic device, the phenakistiscope
• Jacques Tits (1930–2021), Belgian-French mathematician
• Jan Baptist van Helmont (1579–1644), chemist, physiologist and physician
• Pierre François Verhulst (1804–1849), mathematician
• Andreas Vesalius (1514–1564), anatomist and author of the first complete textbook on human anatomy, De Humani Corporis Fabrica (On the Workings of the Human Body)
• Daniel Zajfman (born 1959), Israeli physicist; president of the Weizmann Institute

Intellectuals / religion

• Victor Amédée Jacques Marie Coremans (1802–1872), archivist, journalist, and historian
• Pieter Crockaert (1470–1514), philosopher and theologian of the Southern Netherlands
• Henri La Fontaine (1854–1943), lawyer and president of the International Peace Bureau, Nobel Prize for Peace in 1913
• Henri Kichka (1926–2020), writer and Holocaust survivor
• Xavier de Mérode (1820–1874), prelate, archbishop and statesman of the Papal states
• Victor Serge (1890–1947), Russian revolutionary
• Pascal Vanderveeren (born 1946), lawyer and president of the International Criminal Bar
• Louise van den Plas (1877–1968), suffragist, activist

Sports

• Henri Anspach (1882–1979), épée (Olympic champion) and foil fencer
• Paul Anspach (1882–1991), épée and foil fencer, two-time Olympic champion
• Thierry Boutsen (born 1957), Formula One driver
• Raymond Goethals (1921–2004), (national) soccer trainer; his team Olympique Marseille won the 1993 European Cup
• Georges Grün (born 1962), football (soccer) defender
• Jacky Ickx (born 1945), racing driver
• Aaron Leya Iseka (born 1997), footballer
• Manu Lecomte (born 1995), basketball player in the Israeli Basketball Premier League
• Paul Loicq (1888–1953), president of the International Ice Hockey Federation
• Vincent Kompany (born 1986), football (soccer) player
• Axel Merckx (born 1972 in Uccle), son of Eddy Merckx, professional road bicycle racer, bronze medal Olympic road race 2004
• Tarec Saffiedine (born 1986), martial artist
• Philippe Thys (1890–1971), cyclist and three-time winner of the Tour de France
• Ivo Van Damme (1954–1976), middle distance runner, silver medals at the 1976 Summer Olympics, in both the 800m and 1500m; Memorial van Damme in Brussels, one of the major track and field meets of the season, named in his honour
• Constant Vanden Stock (1914–2008), president and player of Brussels football club R.S.C. Anderlecht
• Franky Vercauteren (born 1956), football left winger in R.S.C. Anderlecht and R.W.D. Molenbeek, football manager in R.S.C. Anderlecht and national soccer trainer
• Nafissatou Thiam (born 1994), athlete, three-time Olympic champion

Miscellaneous

• Augustine De Rothmaler (1859–1942), pedagogue, feminist
• Marc Dutroux (born 1956), serial criminal
• Maxime Weygand (1867–1965), French military commander

Life and work in Brussels

Following notable people lived or worked in Brussels at least during a certain period of their life.

• Jean Absil (1893–1974 in Brussels), composer, organist, and professor at the Brussels Conservatory
• Nicolas Ancion (born 1971), writer, lived and worked 1994–2000 in Brussels
• Henryk Arctowski (1871–1958), scientist and Arctic explorer, worked at the Royal Observatory of Belgium from 1903 to 1909
• Arno (1949–2022), rock artist from Ostend, lived a while in Brussels
• Maurice Béjart (1927–2007), French choreographer; founded the Ballet du XXe Siècle in 1960 and the Mudra School in 1970, both in Brussels
• Jules Bordet (1870–1961), immunologist and microbiologist; founded the Pasteur Institute in Brussels; inner of the 1919 Nobel Prize in Medicine
• Jeroen Brouwers (1940–2022), Dutch author, lived from 1964 until 1976 in Brussels
• Pieter Brueghel the Elder (c. 1525–1569), painter
• Jan Bucquoy (born 1945), filmmaker and director
• Gerald Bull (1928–1990), Canadian engineer, lived and assassinated in Uccle
• Hendrik Conscience (1812–1883), writer
• Alexandra David-Néel (1868–1969), explorer and writer
• Anne Teresa de Keersmaeker (born 1960), choreographer; founded the dance company Rosas in 1983 and the dance school P.A.R.T.S. in 1995 in Brussels
• Marc Didden (born 1949) film director, made Brussels By Night (1983)
• Adil El Arbi (born 1988), film director
• Desiderius Erasmus (c. 1466–1536), humanist and theologian; lived in Anderlecht (Erasmus House) from 31 May until 28 October 1521
• M. C. Escher (1898–1972), Dutch graphic designer, lived in Uccle from 1937 to 1971
• François-Joseph Fétis (1784–1871), musicologist, composer, critic and teacher, one of the most influential music critics of the 19th century; became director of the conservatory of Brussels and the chapelmaster of King Leopold I
• Jan Greshoff (1888–1971), Dutch writer, lived from 1927 until 1939 in Schaerbeek on the August Reyerslaan 130
• Ania Guédroïtz (born 1949), Belgian actress
• Willem Frederik Hermans (1921–1995), Dutch author.
• Victor Horta (1861–1947), architect, one of the most influential European Art Nouveau architects
• Enver Hoxha (1908–1985), Albanian dictator, worked as secretary at the Albanian consulate in Brussels from 1934 to 1936
• Nicholas Lens, author, composer
• René Magritte (1898–1967), surrealist artist
• Ian McCulloch (born 1959), singer of the English rock band Echo & the Bunnymen
• Eddy Merckx (born 1945), considered by many to be the greatest cyclist of all-time; spent youth and adolescence in Brussels
• Jef Mermans (1922–1996), nicknamed "The Bomber", football striker who played much of his career at R.S.C. Anderlecht
• Edward Mosberg (1926–2022), Polish-American Holocaust survivor, educator, and philanthropist
• Eugene Nida (1914–2011), linguist, developer of the dynamic-equivalence Bible-translation theory
• Amélie Nothomb (born 1967), novelist, writing in French
• Emma Orczy (1865–1947), Hungarian-British novelist, spent part of her childhood in Brussels (1868 to 1873)
• Marius Petipa (1818–1910), French ballet choreographer, lived in Brussels from 1824 to 1834 and studied at the Royal Conservatory
• Ilya Prigogine (1917–2003), physicist and chemist; studied chemistry in Brussels and was appointed in 1959 director of the International Solvay Institute in Brussels; awarded the 1977 Nobel Prize in Chemistry
• Adolphe Quetelet (1796–1874 in Brussels), astronomer, mathematician, statistician and sociologist; founded and directed the Brussels Observatory; inventor of the body mass index
• Vini Reilly (Vincent Reilly, born 1953), rock musician, guitarist of the English band The Durutti Column; performed on Morrissey's first solo album in 1988
• Jan van Ruysbroeck (also known as Jan van den Berghe), architect of the 15th century; amongst his work is the belfry of the Hotel de Ville of Brussels
• John of Ruysbroeck (or Jan, Jean, Johannes) (c. 1293–1381), 'mystic', priest in Brussels and Groenendaal
• Jan Zygmunt Skrzynecki (1787–1860), Polish general, high-ranking officer of the Belgian army from 1832 to 1839
• Ernest Solvay (1838–1922), chemist, industrialist and philanthropist; founded institutes and the Solvay Business School in Brussels
• Nicolas de Staël (born Nikolai Vladimirovich Stael von Holstein, 1914–1955), Russian-French abstract painter; lived in Uccle from 1922 to the early 1930; studied at the Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts
• Olivier Strelli (born Nissim Israël, 1946), fashion designer
• Pieter Coecke van Aelst (1502–1550), painter
• Rogier van der Weyden (c. 1399–1464), painter
• Emond van Dynter (c. 1370–1449), writer
• Vincent van Gogh (1853–1890), Dutch painter, studied at the Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts in Brussels from 1880 to 1881
• Paul Van Himst (born 1943), nicknamed Polle Gazon, football player, four-times winner of the Belgian Golden Shoe award, eight-times winner of the Belgian championship with R.S.C. Anderlecht
• Bernaert van Orley (c. 1488–1541), Renaissance painter
• Johan Verminnen (born 1951), singer-songwriter
• George Washington (1871–1946), inventor and first commercial producer of instant coffee, grew up in Brussels
• Henryk Wieniawski (1835–1880), violinist and composer, taught at the Royal Conservatory of Brussels from 1874 to 1877.
• Antoine Wiertz (1806–1865), painter and sculptor
• Jan Yoors (1922–1977), Flemish artist, studied at La Cambre from 1941 to 1942

Brussels as a safe harbor

Brussels was known to be a safe harbor for artists and thinkers facing political (or simply criminal) persecution. This was particularly true during the 19th century, although it was a cause of some debate, and policies were prone to change (e.g. the case of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, who were expelled from the city in 1848).

• Charles Baudelaire (1821–1867), French poet
• Louis Blanc (1811–1882), French poet, French politician and historian
• Georges Boulanger (1837–1891), French general and politician
• Jacques-Louis David (1748–1825), French painter
• José de San Martin (1824–1830), Argentine General and 1st President of Peru
• Alexandre Dumas, père (1802–1870), French author, known for his historical novels
• Friedrich Engels (1820–1895), German social scientist and political philosopher, co-author of The Communist Manifesto
• Willem Frederik Hermans (1921–1995), Dutch writer
• Victor Hugo (1802–1885), one of the most influential French writers of the 19th century; completed Les Misérables in Brussels
• Joachim Lelewel (1786–1861), Polish historian and politician, associate of Karl Marx, lived in Brussels from 1833 to 1861
• Karl Marx (1818–1883), German political philosopher, wrote The Communist Manifesto in Brussels
• Multatuli (Eduard Douwes Dekker) (1820–1887), Dutch author, wrote his masterpiece Max Havelaar in 1859 in Brussels
• Cyprian Norwid (1821–1883), Polish poet, stayed in Brussels from August 1846 to January 1847 after his expulsion from Prussia
• Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (1809–1865), French philosopher, the first individual to call himself an "anarchist"
• Auguste Rodin (1840–1917), French sculptor
• Paul Verlaine (1844–1896), French poet; was joined briefly by the French poet Arthur Rimbaud