His debut at the Brussels gallery Centauri

From the 1920s onwards, Zadkine's work was exhibited in galleries in Brussels and Antwerp, and appreciated by Belgian collectors. “At La Rotonde I knew many Belgian and Dutch painters; they liked my sculpture so much that they wrote about it to Brussels and Rotterdam. That's why, when Modi died, I was invited to Brussels to exhibit at “Le Centaure”, an Art Nouveau gallery which had just opened. [It was not the Le Centaure gallery but the Sélection gallery, in 1920, the date of Modigliani’s death]. This gallery brought together poets, musicians, painters and Belgian art lovers. It was in this gallery that I got to know André de Ridder [de Ridder managed the Sélection gallery with Van Hecke] Permeke, Gustave de Smet and Fritz Vandenberg: it was thanks to this group of writers and artists that I met my first art lovers. M. Gustave van Hecke, M. and Mme Hoffman Stellin and M. Pecher bought drawings and sculptures from me. I liked Belgium a lot; its Flemish painters had a very nice way of appreciating what I was doing. My friendship with G. Pe Smet was to remain strong: when he came to Paris my studio became his home.

 Van Hecke was a Belgian collector, the founder of the Norine fashion house and also director of the magazine Sélection (1921-1927), the Sélection gallery, in Brussels, which he co-directed with André de Ridder (1920-1922), and then of the magazine Variétés.

 He had 4 of Zadkine's sculptures in his possession. In 1928, a monograph edition of the Sélection magazine, published in Antwerp, was devoted to him, including texts by Pierre Humbourg and Waldemar George as well as numerous illustrations.