Maarten van Heemskerck
(1498 - 1574) |
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Portraiture, Secular Narratives Art Work
| Name: |
Maarten van Heemskerck |
| Gender: |
Male |
| Place of Birth: |
Haarlem |
| Nationality: |
Dutch |
| Birth: |
1498 |
| Death: |
1574 |
| Website: |
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| Past Auctions: |
Click Here |
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Quick Facts
| Known For: |
Portraiture, Secular Narratives |
| Medium: |
Oil on canvas |
| Method: |
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| Style: |
Northern Renaissance |
| Fine Art Profession(s): |
painter
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Biography
van Heemskerck was one of the leading Dutch portrait and religious painters of the sixteenth century, famous for his depictions of the Seven Wonders of the World. According to his biography, written by Karel van Mander, he was apprenticed to Cornelis Willemsz in Haarlem. Recalled after a time to the paternal homestead and put to the plough or the milking of cows, young Heemskerk took the first opportunity that offered to run away, and demonstrated his wish to leave home for ever by walking in a single day the 50 miles which separate his native hamlet from the town of Delft. There he studied under Jan Lucasz whom he soon deserted for Jan van Scorel of Haarlem. Even today, many of Heemskerck's paintings are mistaken for work by van Scorel. He boarded at the home of the wealthy Pieter Jan Foppesz (the van Mander spelling is Pieter Ian Fopsen), curate of the Sint-Bavokerk. He knew him because he owned a lot of land in Heemskerck. This is the same man whom he painted in a now famous family portrait, considered the first of its kind in a long line of Dutch family paintings.
In 1532 he started on a wandering tour, during which he visited the whole of northern and central Italy, stopping at Rome, where he had letters of introduction from van Scorel for the influential Dutch cardinal Willem van Enckenvoirt. It is evidence of the facility with which he acquired the rapid execution of a scene-painter that he was selected to co-operate with Antonio da San Gallo, Battista Franco and Francesco de' Rossi (Il Salviati) to decorate the triumphal arches erected at Rome in April 1536 in honour of Charles V. Giorgio Vasari, who saw the battle-pieces which Heemskerk then produced, says they were well composed and boldly executed.
The works of Heemskerk are still very numerous. "Adam and Eve", and "St Luke painting the Likeness of the Virgin and Child" in presence of a poet crowned with ivy leaves, and a parrot in a cagean altar-piece in the gallery of Haarlem, and the "Ecce Homo" in the museum of Ghent, are characteristic works of the period preceding Heemskerk's visit to Italy. An altar-piece executed for "St Laurence of Alkmaar" in 1538-1541, composed of at least a dozen large panels, which including portraits of historical figures is, since the Reformation, preserved in Linkoping Cathedral, Sweden, giving us a clue to his style after his return from the south.
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Samples of Work
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