Flemish Baroque painting was a style of painting in the Southern Netherlands during Spanish control in the 16th and 17th centuries. The period roughly begins when the Dutch Republic was split from the Habsburg Spain regions to the south with the Spanish recapturing of Antwerp in 1585 and goes until about 1700, when Spanish Habsburg authority ended with the death of King Charles II. Antwerp, home to the prominent artists Peter Paul Rubens, Anthony van Dyck, and Jacob Jordaens, was the artistic nexus, while other notable cities include Brussels and Ghent.
Peter Paul Rubens, The Raising of the Cross, c. 1610–1611
Frans Hogenberg, the Calvinist Iconoclastic Riot of August 20, 1566 when many paintings and church decorations were destroyed and subsequently replaced by Late Northern Mannerist and Baroque artists.
Peter Paul Rubens and Frans Snyders, Prometheus Bound, 1611–12. Philadelphia Museum of Art. This painting is Flemish Baroque example of collaboration and specialization. Snyders, who specialized in animals, painted the eagle while Rubens painted the figure of Prometheus.
Frans Francken the Younger, Preziosenwand (Wall of Treasures), 1636. Kunsthistorischesmuseum, Vienna. This type of painting was one of the distinctly Flemish innovations that developed during the early 17th century.
Sir Peter Paul Rubens was a Flemish artist and diplomat. He is considered the most influential artist of the Flemish Baroque tradition. Rubens's highly charged compositions reference erudite aspects of classical and Christian history. His unique and immensely popular Baroque style emphasized movement, colour, and sensuality, which followed the immediate, dramatic artistic style promoted in the Counter-Reformation. Rubens was a painter producing altarpieces, portraits, landscapes, and history paintings of mythological and allegorical subjects. He was also a prolific designer of cartoons for the Flemish tapestry workshops and of frontispieces for the publishers in Antwerp.
Self-Portrait, 1623, Royal Collection
Self-portrait with his brother Philip, Justus Lipsius and Johannes Woverius, 1597
The Fall of Phaeton, 1604, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Madonna on Floral Wreath, together with Jan Brueghel the Elder, 1619