1.
Antwerp
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Antwerp is a city in Belgium, the capital of Antwerp province in the region of Flanders. With a population of 510,610, it is the most populous city proper in Belgium and its metropolitan area houses around 1,200,000 people, which is second behind Brussels. Antwerp is on the River Scheldt, linked to the North Sea by the Westerschelde estuary, the Port of Antwerp is one of the biggest in the world, ranking second in Europe and within the top 20 globally. Antwerp has long been an important city in the Low Countries, the inhabitants of Antwerp are nicknamed Sinjoren, after the Spanish honorific señor or French seigneur, lord, referring to the Spanish noblemen who ruled the city in the 17th century. The city hosted the 1920 Summer Olympics, according to folklore, notably celebrated by a statue in front of the town hall, the city got its name from a legend about a giant called Antigoon who lived near the Scheldt river. He exacted a toll from passing boatmen, and for those who refused, he severed one of their hands, eventually the giant was killed by a young hero named Silvius Brabo, who cut off the giants own hand and flung it into the river. Hence the name Antwerpen, from Dutch hand werpen, akin to Old English hand and wearpan, a longstanding theory is that the name originated in the Gallo-Roman period and comes from the Latin antverpia. Antverpia would come from Ante Verpia, indicating land that forms by deposition in the curve of a river. Note that the river Scheldt, before a period between 600 and 750, followed a different track. This must have coincided roughly with the current ringway south of the city, however, many historians think it unlikely that there was a large settlement which would be named Antverpia, but more something like an outpost with a river crossing. However, John Lothrop Motley argues, and so do a lot of Dutch etymologists and historians, aan t werp is also possible. This warp is a hill or a river deposit, high enough to remain dry at high tide. Another word for werp is pol hence polders, historical Antwerp allegedly had its origins in a Gallo-Roman vicus. Excavations carried out in the oldest section near the Scheldt, 1952–1961, produced pottery shards, the earliest mention of Antwerp dates from the 4th century. In the 4th century, Antwerp was first named, having been settled by the Germanic Franks, the name was reputed to have been derived from anda and werpum. The Merovingian Antwerp was evangelized by Saint Amand in the 7th century, at the end of the 10th century, the Scheldt became the boundary of the Holy Roman Empire. Antwerp became a margraviate in 980, by the German emperor Otto I, in the 11th century Godfrey of Bouillon was for some years known as the marquis of Antwerp. In the 12th century, Norbert of Xanten established a community of his Premonstratensian canons at St. Michaels Abbey at Caloes
2.
Flemish people
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They are one of two principal ethnic groups in Belgium, the other being the French-speaking Walloons. Flemish people make up the majority of the Belgian population, historically, all inhabitants of the medieval County of Flanders were referred to as Flemings, irrespective of the language spoken. The contemporary region of Flanders comprises a part of historical county, as well as parts of the medieval duchy of Brabant. The sense of Flemish identity increased significantly after the Belgian Revolution, prior to this, the term Flemings in the Dutch language was in first place used for the inhabitants of the former County of Flanders. Flemish however had been used since the 14th century to refer to the language, the modern Belgian province of Limburg was not part of the treaty, and only came to be considered Flemish in the 19th century. In 1830 the southern provinces of the United Netherlands proclaimed their independence, under French rule, French was enforced as the only official language in public life, resulting in a Frenchification of the elites and, to a lesser extent, the middle classes. The Dutch King allowed the use of both Dutch and French dialects as administrative languages in the Flemish provinces and he also enacted laws to reestablish Dutch in schools. Lastly, Belgian liberals were dissatisfied with William for his despotic behaviour. Following the revolt, the reforms of 1823 were the first Dutch laws to be abolished. After the Hundred Years War many Flemings migrated to the Azores, by 1490 there were 2,000 Flemings living in the Azores. Willem van der Haegen was the sea captain who brought settlers from Flanders to the Azores. Today many Azoreans trace their genealogy from present day Flanders, within Belgium the Flemings form a clearly distinguishable group, set apart by their language and customs. However, the perception of being a single polity varies greatly, depending on subject matter, locality. Generally, Flemings will seldom identify themselves as being Dutch and vice versa and this is partly caused by the popular stereotypes in the Netherlands as well as Flanders which are mostly based on the cultural extremes of both Northern and Southern culture. It is the majority language in Belgium, being spoken natively by three-fifths of the population and its various dialects contain a number of lexical and a few grammatical features which distinguish them from the standard language. As in the Netherlands, the pronunciation of Standard Dutch is affected by the dialect of the speaker. All Dutch dialects spoken in Belgium are spoken in adjacent areas of the Netherlands as well, at the same time East Flemish forms a continuum with both Brabantic and West Flemish. Standard Dutch is primarily based on the Hollandic dialect and to an extent on Brabantian
3.
Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester
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Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester KG was an English nobleman and the favourite and close friend of Elizabeth Is, from her first year on the throne until his death. He was a suitor for the hand for many years. Dudleys youth was overshadowed by the downfall of his family in 1553 after his father, Robert Dudley was condemned to death but was released in 1554 and took part in the Battle of St. Quentin under Philip II of Spain, which led to his full rehabilitation. On Elizabeth Is accession in November 1558, Dudley was appointed Master of the Horse, in October 1562, he became a Privy Councillor and, in 1587, was appointed Lord Steward of the Royal Household. In 1564, Dudley became Earl of Leicester and, from 1563, one of the greatest landowners in North Wales, Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, was one of Elizabeths leading statesmen, involved in domestic as well as foreign politics alongside William Cecil and Francis Walsingham. Although he refused to be married to Mary, Queen of Scots, Dudley was for a time relatively sympathetic to her until, from the mid-1580s. As patron of the Puritan movement, he supported non-conforming preachers, a champion also of the international Protestant cause, he led the English campaign in support of the Dutch Revolt. His acceptance of the post of Governor-General of the United Provinces infuriated Queen Elizabeth, the expedition was a military and political failure, and it ruined the Earl financially. Leicester was engaged in many business ventures and was one of the main backers of Francis Drake. During the Spanish Armada, the Earl was in command of the English land forces. In this function, he invited Queen Elizabeth to visit her troops at Tilbury and this was the last of many events he had organised over the years, the most spectacular being the festival at his seat Kenilworth Castle in 1575 on occasion of a three-week visit by the Queen. Dudley was a patron of the arts, literature. Robert Dudleys private life interfered with his career and vice versa. When his first wife, Amy Robsart, fell down a flight of stairs and died in 1560, however, the resulting scandal very much reduced his chances in this respect. Popular rumours that he had arranged for his wifes death continued throughout his life, for 18 years he did not remarry for Queen Elizabeths sake and when he finally did, his new wife, Lettice Knollys, was permanently banished from court. This and the death of his legitimate son and heir were heavy blows. Shortly after the death in 1584, a virulent libel known as Leicesters Commonwealth was circulated in England. It laid the foundation of a literary and historiographical tradition that depicted the Earl as the Machiavellian master courtier
4.
Notname
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In art history, a notname is an invented name given to an artist whose identity has been lost. The practice arose from the need to such artists and their typically untitled, or generically titled works. Linking a generically titled old master with a person is usually a tempting and exciting prospect. The given notname usually depends on the location, the most distinctive feature of their work. Some notnames created based on an artwork, called namepiece. The Berlin Painter was named by Sir John Beazley for a large lidded amphora in the Antikensammlung Berlin, in the case of 14th and early 15th-century Netherlandish, French and German painters and illuminators, the problem is particularly acute and stems from a number of factors. Primarily, the practice of signing and dating works is seen in the region until the 1420s. It is probably a truism to say that, as Susie Nash put it, some art historians believe that this has led to a lack of caution in connecting works with historical persons, and that such connections often hang on thin threads of circumstantial evidence. Examples include Hugo van der Goes, Robert Campin, Stefan Lochner, list of anonymous masters Nash, Susie
5.
Guild of Saint Luke
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The Guild of Saint Luke was the most common name for a city guild for painters and other artists in early modern Europe, especially in the Low Countries. They were named in honor of the Evangelist Luke, the saint of artists. One of the most famous such organizations was founded in Antwerp and it continued to function until 1795, although by then it had lost its monopoly and therefore most of its power. In most cities, including Antwerp, the government had given the Guild the power to regulate defined types of trade within the city. Guild membership, as a master, was required for an artist to take on apprentices or to sell paintings to the public. Similar rules existed in Delft, where members could sell paintings in the city or have a shop. The guild of Saint Luke not only represented painters, sculptors, and other artists, but also—especially in the seventeenth century—dealers, amateurs. In traditional guild structures, house-painters and decorators were often in the same guild, however, as artists formed under their own specific guild of St. Luke, particularly in the Netherlands, distinctions were increasingly made. In general, guilds also made judgments on disputes between artists and other artists or their clients, in such ways, it controlled the economic career of an artist working in a specific city, while in different cities they were wholly independent and often competitive against each other. Although it did not become an artistic center until the sixteenth century, Antwerp was one of, if not the first. It is first mentioned in 1382, and was given privileges by the city in 1442. The registers, or Liggeren, from the guild exist, cataloging when artists became masters, who the dean for each year was, what their specialities were, and the names of any students. Perhaps because of this link, for a period they had a rule that all miniatures needed a tiny mark to identify the artist, only under special privileges, such as court artist, could an artist effectively practice their craft without holding membership in the guild. Membership also allowed members to sell works at the guild-owned showroom, Antwerp, for example, opened a market stall for selling paintings in front of the cathedral in 1460, and Bruges followed in 1482. Guilds of St. Luke in the Dutch Republic began to reinvent themselves as cities there changed over to Protestant rule, many St. Luke guilds reissued charters to protect the interests of local painters from the influx of southern talent from places like Antwerp and Bruges. Many cities in the republic became more important artistic centres in the late sixteenth. Amsterdam was the first city to reissue a St. Lukes charter after the reformation in 1579, and it included painters, sculptors, engravers, for example, Gouda, Rotterdam, and Delft, all founded guilds between 1609 and 1611. On the other hand, these distinctions did not take effect at that time in Amsterdam or Haarlem, in the Haarlem Guild of St. Luke, however, a strict hierarchy was attempted in 1631 with panel painters at the top, though this hierarchy was eventually rejected
6.
Joachim Beuckelaer
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Joachim Beuckelaer was a Flemish painter specialising in market and kitchen scenes with elaborate displays of food and household equipment. He also painted known to have painted still life with no figures in the central scene and his development of the genre of market and kitchen scenes was influential on the development of still life art in Northern Europe as well as Italy. Details about the life of the artist are scarce, Beuckelaer was born in Antwerp into a family of painters. He was likely the son of the painter Mattheus Beuckeleer and the brother of Huybrecht Beuckeleer and his brother also became a painter and the works of Huybrecht have occasionally been misattributed to Joachim. He possibly learned to paint in the workshop of his uncle, Pieter Aertsen, Aertsen was best known for his market and kitchen scenes, genres. Beuckelaer became an independent master in the Antwerp Guild of Saint Luke in 1560, Beuckelaer remained active in Antwerp throughout his career and continued to develop themes pioneered in painting by Aertsen, but arguably surpassing his presumed master in skill. The date of his death is not known with certainty but fell likely between 1570 and 1574, Beuckelaer specialised in market and kitchen scenes with elaborate displays of food and household equipment. During the 1560s, especially during the part of the decade, Beuckelaer painted some purely religious works, for which, unlike the kitchen and market scenes. In this period he made designs for stained glass. Beuckelaers market scenes, like those of Aertsen, often incorporate biblical episodes in the background and his Four Elements series, acquired by the National Gallery, London in 2001, exemplifies this on a large scale. Water, for example, shows a market selling twelve kinds of fish. Through an archway in the background Christ can be seen walking on the Sea of Galilee after his resurrection, both Aertsen and Beuckelaer gradually developed images that detached the world of produce from the religious content of their earlier hybrid images. These later works depict either kitchens or markets and the associated with those activities. The later paintings by Beuckelaer show a greater profusion of foodstuffs in the market scenes, Beuckelaer also produced several images of fish stalls, often with background religious scenes, but sometimes completely separated from any additional narrative or reference. In the year 1563 Beuckelaer was experimenting with more outspoken landscape settings in an innovative way, one of the still lives without figures in the kitchen or market scene itself is the Kitchen scene with Christ at Emmaus is unique in his oeuvre. In this composition Beuckelaer painted a kitchen with numerous ingredients for a meal, vegetables, fruits, nuts, poultry. The table linen and crockery are also in view, in the background, Beuckelaer depicted the biblical story of Christ at Emmaus. This story is pushed into the background while the matter of the dinner preparations for Christs visit at Emmaus has become the painting’s main subject
7.
Pieter Aertsen
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Pieter Aertsen, called Lange Pier because of his height, was a Dutch painter in the style of Northern Mannerism. He is credited with the invention of the genre scene. He was active in his native city Amsterdam but also worked for a period in Antwerp. His genre scenes were influential on later Flemish Baroque painting, Dutch still life painting and his peasant scenes preceded by a few years the much better-known paintings produced in Antwerp by Pieter Bruegel the Elder. He was apprenticed with Allaert Claesz and he then travelled to the Southern Netherlands and took up residence in Antwerp, first with his compatriot Jan Mandijn. Aertsen became a member of Antwerps Guild of Saint Luke, in the official books of the Guild he is recorded as Langhe Peter, schilder. In 1542 he became a citizen of Antwerp and he also got married to Kathelijne Beuckelaar, the daughter and sister of an Antwerp painter and aunt of Joachim Beuckelaer and Huybrecht Beuckeleer. Of the couples eight children, three sons, Pieter, Aert, and Dirk became successful painters, Aertsen returned to Amsterdam in 1555-56. Notable pupils who trained in his workshop included Stradanus and Aertsens nephews, Joachim Beuckelaer, Joachim Beuckelaer continued and further developed Aertsens style and subject matter of painting. A similar inversion in landscape painting had developed by Joachim Patinir in Antwerp several decades earlier when he invented the world landscape. Unlike these, in Aertsens works the genre dominates the front of the image, with the history scene, normally religious. The sign at top right advertises the land behind as for sale, the painting offers the viewer a range of options for life, in an allegory on physical and spiritual food. The painting carries the coat of arms of Antwerp, suggesting it was a civic commission, such subjects were mostly painted before about 1560. In the Renaissance, the example of the painter Peiraikos, known only from Pliny the Elder, was important in justifying genre. One surviving religious work is the Crucifixion in the Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp, unlike Pieter Bruegel the Elder, Aertsens genre figures were mostly depicted idealized with considerable dignity and no effort at comedy, using poses that ultimately derived from classical art. In some cases appear to have been borrowed from the contemporary court portraiture of artists such as Anthonis Mor. Falkenberg, R. L. Pieter Aertsen, Rhyparographer,1995 Falkenberg, R. L. Northern Renaissance Art,1985, Harry N. Abrams, ISBN0136235964 Sullivan, Margaret A. Aertsens Kitchen and Market Scenes, Audience and Innovation in Northern Art, The Art Bulletin, Vol.81, No
8.
Antonis Mor
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For the musician, see Anthony More. Sir Anthonis Mor, also known as Anthonis Mor van Dashorst and Antonio Moro was a Netherlandish portrait painter, much in demand by the courts of Europe. He has also referred to as Antoon, Anthonius, Anthonis or Mor van Dashorst. Mor was born in Utrecht, Netherlands, by some estimation between 1516 and 1520, little is known about his early life, except that his artistic education commenced under Jan van Scorel. His earliest known work is a portrait which is currently in a collection in Stockholm, a group of Knights of St. Between 1549 and 1550 Prince Philip II of Spain traveled around the Netherlands to present himself as the future ruler, Anthonis Mor painted his portrait in Brussels in 1549. He probably visited Italy, where he copied works by Titian. In the middle of 1550 Anthonis Mor left for Lisbon with a commission from Maria of Hungary to portray the Portuguese branch of the family. Mor probably traveled via Valladolid, where he painted the portraits of Maximilian II and his wife Maria of Austria, their daughter Anna, in Lisbon, Mor portrayed King João, Queen Catharina, Prince João and Philip’s future wife, Princess Maria of Portugal. Little more is known about Mors stay in Portugal, but he was back in Brussels by November 1553. After the sudden death of the king of England, Edward VI, in July 1553, the engagement between Philip and his Portuguese princess was broken and negotiations started for a marriage with the successor to the English throne, Mary Tudor. During these negotiations, Anthonis Mor was sent to England to paint a portrait of Mary and this portrait was much appreciated in England and Mor made at least three versions, which became much the best-known likeness of the queen. On 20 December 1553, Philip officially appointed Mor as painter in his service, in October 1555, Charles V abdicated from the throne. During the ceremonies and festivities surrounding the coronation of his son Philip as king of Spain, unfortunately, many of these paintings are lost or only known through copies. Following the death of Mary Tudor in 1558, King Philip was remarried in June 1559 to Isabella de Valois and this portrait appears to have been lost. Also from this period dates the only known self-portrait of Mor, now in the Uffizi Gallery and it seems likely that Anthonis Mor accompanied King Philip on his return to Spain in 1559. That Mor stayed at the Spanish court is confirmed by the letters which Philip regularly sent to Mor after he had left again in 1561, in his letters, Philip requested Mors return to court several times, but the painter never complied with his repeated requests. Among the works which Mor supposedly painted in Spain are the Portrait of Juana of Austria, a much-praised work from this period is the Portrait of Pejerón, the fool of the Earl of Benavente and the Duke of Alba
9.
Willem Key
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Willem Adriaensz Key was a Flemish renaissance painter. Key was born in Breda, Netherlands, in 1529 he was know to be a pupil of Pieter Coecke van Aelst in Antwerp. Later, together with Frans Floris, he took lessons from Lambert Lombardus in Liège and he became a member of the Guild of St. Luke in Antwerp in 1540. He was a man who lived in a large house in the center of town near the exchange. He became specialized in flattering portraits and made a living from theatrically posed group portraits. In van Manders biography, he mentions several pieces by his hand that were burned during the Beeldenstorm. In particular he mentions a group portrait of the market-sellers on an altar of the Onze-Lieve-Vrouwekathedraal in Antwerp. When these men were executed on the square in Brussels on 5 June 1568, he was so upset that he died on the same day. This story was accepted as the truth, but van Mander found it hard to believe. In any case it is interesting to note that many of his paintings were destroyed, while he is best known today for his portrait of the Duke of Alva, that was copied many times. And truly the Son of man goeth, as it was determined, and they began to enquire among themselves, which of them it was that should do this thing. — Luke 22, 21-23 KJV According to the Rijksmuseum, Adriaen Thomasz Key was a distant relation, media related to Willem Key at Wikimedia Commons
10.
Fall of Antwerp
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The Siege of Antwerp took place during the Eighty Years War from July 1584 until August 1585. At the time Antwerp, in modern Belgium, was not only the largest Dutch city, on 4 November 1576, unpaid Spanish soldiery mutinied, they plundered and burnt the city during what was called the Spanish Fury. Thousands of citizens were massacred and hundreds of houses were burnt down, as a result, Antwerp became even more engaged in the rebellion against the rule of Habsburg Spain. The city joined the Union of Utrecht and became the capital of the Dutch Revolt, when the siege of Antwerp began most of the County of Flanders and the Duchy of Brabant, including Brussels, had been recaptured in the preceding year. The army of Flanders had been reinforced in the previous years, during the recapture of Flanders and Brabant, Parma improved the logistics of the Spanish army in Flanders by further investing in what is dubbed the Spanish Route. When the siege of Antwerp began Parmas army was well supplied, the first stage of the siege saw encirclement lines constructed around Antwerp and forts built along the Scheldt estuary. The second stage consisted of commencing a long siege of Antwerp and constructing a bridge across the Scheldt, effectively closing off the citys waterways. The bridge, a feat of siege engineering at its time. 800 Spaniards are said to have killed, Caspar de Robles being one of the casualties. At one time, the rebels sent the Finis Bellis, a floating platform into which they put great hope, against the bridge. In the end the Dutch abandoned their efforts, considering Antwerp a lost cause, on 17 August 1585, Antwerp surrendered. After the siege, the Dutch fleet on the river Scheldt was kept in position, blocking the access to the sea. Parma stationed experienced Castilian troops within Antwerp to make sure the city would not fall into enemy hands, some returned to Roman Catholicism but many moved north and ended what had been a golden century for the city. Of the pre-siege population of 100,000 people, only 40,000 remained, many of Antwerps skilled tradesmen were included in the Protestant migration to the north, laying the commercial foundation for the subsequent Dutch Golden Age of the northern United Provinces. Although the city returned to prosperity, the Dutch blockade of shipping in the Scheldt remained in place. The blockade was maintained for the two centuries and was an important and traumatic element in the history of relations between the Netherlands and what was to become Belgium. The Revolt of the Netherlands, 1555–1609
11.
Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium
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The Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium are a group of art museums in Brussels, Belgium. In 1845 it is decided by royal Decree that a museum is to be founded with works of art of deceswed and this is accorded by Minister Sylvain van de Weyer a national Commission is founded to select important works of art. This commission is presided by the First president Count de Beaufort, other members are, Gustaf Wappers, President of the Royal Museum of Antwerpen. François-Joseph Navez, President of the Académie royale des beaux-arts de Bruxelles, guillaume Geefs Eugène Simonis Tilman-François Suys, professor at the Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts. Much of the members were active in the Royal Academy of Science, Letters and Fine Arts of Belgium. The museums are situated in the capital Brussels in the area on the Coudenberg. There are six museums connected with the Royal Museum, and two of them, are in the main building, the Royal Museum contains over 20,000 drawings, sculptures, and paintings, which date from the early 15th century to the present. The museum has a collection of Flemish painting, among them paintings by Bruegel and Rogier van der Weyden, Robert Campin, Anthony van Dyck. The museum is also proud of its Rubens Room, which more than 20 paintings by the artist. The painting Landscape with the Fall of Icarus, long-attributed to Brueghel, is located here and forms the subject of W. H. Audens famous poem Musée des Beaux Arts, named after the museum. The chief curators of the museum have been or are, from 1961 till 1984, balat was the kings principal architect, and this was one part of the kings vast building program for Belgium. The building was completed in 1887, and stands as an example of the Beaux-Arts architecture use of themed statuary to assert the identity, the finial, gilded Genius of Art was also designed by de Groot. The two bas-relief panels are Music by Thomas Vincotte and Industrial Arts by Charles Brunin, the two bronze groups on pedestals represent The Crowning of Art by Paul de Vigne, and The Teaching of Art by Charles van der Stappen. On the side of the building, a memorial commemorates five members of the Mouvement National Royaliste, a resistance group, killed during the liberation of Brussels on 3–4 September 1944
12.
Santi di Tito
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Santi di Tito was one of the most influential and leading Italian painters of the proto-Baroque style – what is sometimes referred to as Counter-Maniera or Counter-Mannerism. He was born in Borgo San Sepolcro, in Tuscany, there is little documentation to support the alleged training under Bronzino or Baccio Bandinelli. From 1558 to 1564, he worked in Rome on frescoes in Palazzo Salviati and he acquired a classical trait, described as Raphaelesque by S. J. This style contrasted with the reigning ornate Roman painterliness of Federico and Taddeo Zuccari or their Florentine equivalents, Vasari, Alessandro Allori, after returning to Florence in 1564, he joined the Accademia del Disegno. He contributed two conventionally Mannerist paintings for the Dukes study and laboratory, the Studiolo of Francesco I in the Palazzo Vecchio and this artistic project was partly overseen by Giorgio Vasari. These paintings – the Sisters of Fetonte and Hercules and Iole – like many of those in the studiolo, are stylized and overcrowded, baldinucci recounts that Santi completely rejected the maniera of Bronzino, and embraced a classical Reformist and naturalistic style. Santi died in Florence on July 23,1603, santis mature style is reflected in his masterpiece of the Vision of Saint Thomas Aquinas, also known as Saint Thomas Dedicating His Works to Christ located in the church of San Marco in Florence. The work has an earnest fervor lacking in his earlier mannerist works and this new contra-maniera style finds some echoes in the rising Bolognese Baroque style of the Carracci. Among his pupils were Ludovico Cigoli, the painter of art Reform in late sixteenth. Another pupil named Francesco Mochi became a prominent sculptor in the Baroque style and created, among other pieces, media related to Santi di Tito at Wikimedia Commons
13.
Jan Sanders van Hemessen
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Jan Sanders van Hemessen was a leading Flemish Renaissance painter, belonging to the group of Italianizing Flemish painters called the Romanists, who were influenced by Italian Renaissance painting. Hemessen played an important role in the development of painting, through his large scenes with religious or worldly subjects, set in towns with contemporary dress. These focused on human failings such as greed and vanity, one of his best known works, the Parable of the Prodigal Son now in Brussels, was also a key forerunner of the later merry company tradition, and he painted a pure genre painting set in tavern. He also painted a number of portraits, some of exceptional quality. He was based in Antwerp between 1519 and 1550, joining the artists Guild of Saint Luke there in 1524, after 1550 he may have moved to Haarlem. He painted several subjects, and many others may have been destroyed in the Beeldenstorm that swept through Antwerp in the year of his death. Jan Sanders van Hemessen was born in Hemiksem, then called Hemessen or Heymissen and he was an apprentice of Hendrick van Cleve I in Antwerp. He traveled to Italy early in his career, around 1520, here he studied both models from classical antiquity, such as the Laocoön as well as the contemporary works of Michelangelo and Raphael. He returned to Antwerp where he entered the local Guild of Saint Luke as a master in 1524, van Hemessen is believed to have worked early in his career at the royal court in Mechelen. Here he may have first encountered Jan Gossaert, a court painter, although the early biographer Karel van Mander wrote that van Hemessen spent time in Haarlem, there is no evidence for this statement. Van Hemessen was married to Barbara de Fevre with whom he had two daughters, after his wifes death, he had an illegitimate son called Peeter with his maid Betteken. After the death of Jan Sanders van Hemessen and Betteken, Peeter was legitimised in 1579, Jan Sanders van Hemessen trained his daughter Catharina van Hemessen who became a successful portrait painter. It is not known where van Hemessen died, van Hemessen was one of the earliest Netherlandish artists to exploit the genre character of biblical subjects often for a moralizing purpose. Van Hemessen specialized in scenes of human character flaws such as vanity and his pictures often have a religious subject. His style helped found the Flemish traditions of genre painting, van Hemessen was also a portrait painter. His Mannerist style is characterised by muscular and palpably three-dimensional figures, a densely packed foreground of abruptly cropped forms, Jan Sanders van Hemessen is associated with the development of the tavern scene or merry company in Flemish genre painting. He commenced his compositions on this theme with a 1536 painting on a religious subject, the foreground of the composition shows the prodigal son during his days of high living in the company of prostitutes, music, wine and gambling. Van Hemessen produced more tavern scenes that stress the theme of unbridled living where drinking causes more sinfulness such as the Loose Company, the subject matter provided van Hemessen with another occasion to use a religious subject to convey a moral message
14.
Floris van Dyck
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Floris van Dyck, also called Floris van Dijck or Floris Claesz. van Dyck was a Dutch Golden Age still life painter. Van Dyck lived in Haarlem for most of his life, and he was a cousin of Pieter Cornelisz van Rijck, whose father Cornelis first had a brewery in Delft before moving to the brewery De Olyphant in Haarlem. Thanks to this miracle cure, Arpino could finish an altarpiece in the Archbasilica of St. John Lateran, in 1606 he returned to the Netherlands, where he settled in Haarlem and became one of Karel van Manders sources on modern Italian painters for his Schilder-boeck. He probably lived with or near his uncle, the brewer Cornelis van Rijck. Like the young Frans Hals and other assistants to Karel van Mander, Floris is not listed with his own entry in that book, after Karel van Manders death, Floris joined the Haarlem Guild of St. Luke in 1610 and became dean in 1637. On 11 September 1625 he married for the time to Cornelia Jansdr. Vlasman and the wealthy Gijsbert Claesz van Campen was his only witness and he was influenced by Osias Beert and Clara Peeters and is considered the inventor of the banketje, together with Nicolaes Gillis. Besides Nicolaes Gilles, he influenced the painters Floris van Schooten, Pieter Claesz, paintings Floris van Dijck - Rijksmuseum Artcyclopedia entry
15.
Netherlands Institute for Art History
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The Netherlands Institute for Art History or RKD is located in The Hague and is home to the largest art history center in the world. The center specializes in documentation, archives, and books on Western art from the late Middle Ages until modern times, all of this is open to the public, and much of it has been digitized and is available on their website. The main goal of the bureau is to collect, categorize, via the available databases, the visitor can gain insight into archival evidence on the lives of many artists of past centuries. The library owns approximately 450,000 titles, of which ca.150,000 are auction catalogs, there are ca.3,000 magazines, of which 600 are currently running subscriptions. Though most of the text is in Dutch, the record format includes a link to library entries and images of known works. The RKD also manages the Dutch version of the Art and Architecture Thesaurus, the original version is an initiative of the Getty Research Institute in Los Angeles, California. Their bequest formed the basis for both the art collection and the library, which is now housed in the Koninklijke Bibliotheek. Though not all of the holdings have been digitised, much of its metadata is accessible online. The website itself is available in both a Dutch and an English user interface, in the artist database RKDartists, each artist is assigned a record number. To reference an artist page directly, use the code listed at the bottom of the record, usually of the form, https, for example, the artist record number for Salvador Dalí is 19752, so his RKD artist page can be referenced. In the images database RKDimages, each artwork is assigned a record number, to reference an artwork page directly, use the code listed at the bottom of the record, usually of the form, https, //rkd. nl/en/explore/images/ followed by the artworks record number. For example, the record number for The Night Watch is 3063. The Art and Architecture Thesaurus also assigns a record for each term, rather, they are used in the databases and the databases can be searched for terms. For example, the painting called The Night Watch is a militia painting, the thesaurus is a set of general terms, but the RKD also contains a database for an alternate form of describing artworks, that today is mostly filled with biblical references. To see all images that depict Miriams dance, the associated iconclass code 71E1232 can be used as a search term. Official website Direct link to the databases The Dutch version of the Art and Architecture Thesaurus
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Media related to Huybrecht Beuckeleer at Wikimedia Commons
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