was chairman of the Oost-Vlaamse Federatie voor Kunstenaars (East Flanders Federation of Artists) and a member of the Nederlandsche Kultuurkamer, an institution set up by the German occupier, which all artists, architects, writers, journalists, musicians, film actors and stage performers had to join in order to be allowed to work. He was also a member of the Duitsch-Vlaamsche Arbeidsgemeenschap (DeVlag) (German-Flemish Labor Community) which in May 1941 was incorporated in the occupier's SS structures. In 1940, he led a delegation of Flemish artists to Germany were they met with the German propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels. After this trip to Germany, he thanked the "great cultural reformer Dr. Goebbels" in the name of his art brothers. On that occasion, he wished for Flanders "a leader with the genius of an Adolf Hitler (...) so that the Flemish-national socialist order may come here too". He also attended the German culture days in Cologne in May 1941, along with August Borms and Rob van Roosbroeck. Whereas in earlier letters he signed 'Heil Dinaso', from September 1941 he ended his letters with 'Heil Hitler'. He further participated in the Flemish-German culture days. He received favourable press releases and was able to participate in group exhibitions in Germany. He also made some clear pro-German statements and linked his art to the cultural propaganda of the New Order. Final years At the end of 1944, he fled with his daughter via Holland, Germany and Austria to Switzerland where they arrived shortly before the end of the war. Here they were initially interned in a former bleachery in Bühler. He created some murals in the improvised chapel in the internment camp. He was released from the internment centre by the end of 1945. Fellow artists Constant Permeke and accused him of turning in people to the Germans. In July 1947, a Belgian court sentenced him in absentia to 10 years of prison. The sentence was reduced to five years in 1961 and suspended in 1964. The first postwar Servaes exhibition to be held in his home country in Bruges caused a stir as Evarist De Buck and some resistance groups protested vehemently against it by reason of the role he had played in the collaboration with the Germans. Servaes became a naturalised citizen of Switzerland. He remained a resident of Lucern in Switzerland for the rest of his life. Work Common themes of Servaes' paintings were landscapes,