Julie Delcourt

For decades, the erotic watercolors and sketches attributed to “Julie Delcourt” have lived in the shadow of a single name: Gerhard Georg August Gagelmann. Auction houses, wikis, and collectors repeated the same line: Delcourt is Gagelmann’s pseudonym, a post-war private indulgence.
The evidence for this theory? Stylistic overlap, shared themes, and the convenient absence of any biography for Julie herself.

For me, the Gagelmann = Delcourt theory always felt like it was just off. When I study the signed sketches, I see the hand of a woman: soft, intimate, playful in a way his rigid Deco lines never were.
Diving into Gagelmann’s life, I hit a wall: his marriage to Ilse Ziegler, a fellow illustrator who worked alongside him until their 1933 divorce. Suddenly another theory clicked into place. What if the origin of these drawings lies with Julie Delcourt and Gagelmann simply took them over?
Who, then, was the mysterious Julie? Could she have been Ilse Ziegler under a pseudonym?

Fact is that there are four signed, dated 1938 pieces: two pencil sketches and two full watercolors.
Every artwork carries the unmistakable cursive “Julie Delcourt 1938” in the lower right corner.
No monogram. No “Ga.” (Gagelmann), no trace of Gagelmann’s geometric hand.
All four artworks dated 1938, five years before Gagelmann’s Nazi postcard series, and well before his supposed post-war erotic phase.

Handwriting Forensics (with help of a digital assistent)

• Identical “J” loop, left-curving, open top.
• “i” dot always left of the stem – a rare, consistent quirk.
• “t” crossbar with a gentle upward hook.
• 1938 numerals smaller than letters, identical proportions.
• No hesitation, no over-tracing – fluent, practiced hand.

Overlay the four signatures: they align perfectly. This is one artist, writing in 1938.
Compare to Gagelmann’s known signatures (Die Deutsche Elite, 1920s ads, personal letters):

• His capitals are sharp, art-deco.
• His “i” dots sit above or are absent.
• His pressure is heavy and graphic.

No match.

Timeline That Breaks the Myth

Year	Gagelmann	Delcourt (signed)
1924	Marries Ilse Ziegler	—
1926–30	Commercial fashion for Textil-Zeitung	—
1933	Divorce from Ilse	—
1938	Deep in Weimar decline, pre-Nazi propaganda	All four works created & signed
1943	Frauen Schaffen für Euch postcards	—
1950s?	Alleged private erotic series	—

Gagelmann was busy with state commissions in 1938. He had no time, no French pseudonym, no watercolor erotic output. The signed Delcourt works predate his supposed kink phase by over a decade.

So Who Was Julie Delcourt?

The simplest answer is now the strongest: a real woman, working in 1938.

• French name, French titles (Le premier lavement, L’initiation).
• Soft, narrative, humorous style – far from Gagelmann’s rigid Deco lines.
• Two signed watercolors – never documented before. The rest of the 120+ unsigned series may be expansions, copies, or later homages.

Was she:

• A Parisian or Brussels underground illustrator?
• Ilse Ziegler under a taboo-proof pseudonym post-divorce?
• A female collaborator in Gagelmann’s studio who vanished after 1938?

We don’t know yet. But we do know she existed and she signed her name.
So instead of listing her as part of Gagelmann’s legacy, I believe we should honor her as a stand-alone artist. Who knows, maybe in time more information will surface.

5 albums/23 artworks - one album looked to different and is stored under Anonymous - Mixed Sketches (1950)
Latest Update: November 7, 2025 -> Created a new page for this artist and relocated a few albums
Latest Update: November 7, 2025 -> Created a page for this artist (4 artworks)

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Karen Smits