Aleijda Wolfsen - Seated woman in a flower brocade dress with dog and seashell with landscape beyond

Aleijda Wolfsen (22 October 1648 – 25 August 1692), was a

Dutch Golden Age The Dutch Golden Age ( nl, Gouden Eeuw ) was a period in the history of the Netherlands, roughly spanning the era from 1588 (the birth of the Dutch Republic) to 1672 (the Rampjaar, "Disaster Year"), in which Dutch trade, science, and art an ...

painter.

Biography

She was born in

Zwolle Zwolle () is a city and municipality in the Northeastern Netherlands. It is the capital of the province of Overijssel and the province's second-largest municipality after Enschede with a population of 130,592 as of 1 December 2021. Zwolle is on ...

as the daughter of the wealthy mayor Hendrik Wolfsen (1615-1684), and Aleijda Verwers (1626-1665) in the house on the ''Grote Aa bij de Wal'', that was later renamed to Melkmarkt 53.Aleida Wolfsen
in historici.nl Her father held important political offices and in 1657 the family moved to

The Hague The Hague ( ; nl, Den Haag or ) is a list of cities in the Netherlands by province, city and municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality of the Netherlands, situated on the west coast facing the North Sea. The Hague is the country's ad ...

, though the house in Zwolle was kept on. Young Aleijda became a pupil of

Caspar Netscher Caspar (or Gaspar) Netscher (1639 – January 15, 1684) was a Dutch portrait and genre painter. He was a master in depicting oriental rugs, silk and brocade and introduced an international style to the Northern Netherlands. Life According to A ...

.Aleida Wolfsen
in the

RKD The Netherlands Institute for Art History or RKD (Dutch: RKD-Nederlands Instituut voor Kunstgeschiedenis), previously Rijksbureau voor Kunsthistorische Documentatie (RKD), is located in The Hague and is home to the largest art history center i ...

She was a friend of the family, who she may have known from Zwolle, where Netscher had been a pupil of

Gerard ter Borch Gerard ter Borch (; December 1617 – 8 December 1681), also known as Gerard Terburg (), was a Dutch genre painter who lived in the Dutch Golden Age. He influenced fellow Dutch painters Gabriel Metsu, Gerrit Dou, Eglon van der Neer and Johann ...

. Her name appeared often as witness to the birth of Netscher's children. In 1665 Aleijda's mother died in childbirth with her 11th baby. Her father remarried three years later in 1668, but not before Aleijda herself had married the mayor of Zwolle Pieter Soury on 5 October 1667 in

Rijswijk Rijswijk (), formerly known as Ryswick ( ) in English, is a city and municipality in the western Netherlands, in the province of South Holland. Its population was in , and it has an area of , of which is water. The municipality also includes th ...

. She moved into the Zwolle house with her husband and like her father had done, kept the house on despite moving with her husband for a few years to The Hague and Amsterdam. She kept on with her painting after her marriage, which was unusual for her time. Her father wrote a poem in an album kept by

Gesina ter Borch Gesina ter Borch (Deventer 15 November 1631 – Zwolle 16 April 1690) was a Dutch Golden Age watercolorist and draftswoman, whose work mostly consists of watercolor paintings in albums. Most of her work captured her observations of family life, ...

in 1660, indicating that the family socialized in artist circles.

Works

Her earliest signed work is from 1670, and her latest work was dated 1691. Her works are mostly portraits in the family circle of friends, with a few historical allegories. Aleijda was widely known and respected as a painter, and is recorded as painting the portrait of

William III of England William III (William Henry; ; 4 November 16508 March 1702), also widely known as William of Orange, was the sovereign Prince of Orange from birth, Stadtholder of Holland, Zeeland, Utrecht, Guelders, and Overijssel in the Dutch Republic from ...

in 1674. Her biography was included by

Jacob Campo Weyerman Jacob Campo Weyerman (9 August 1677 – 9 March 1747) was a painter and writer during the period known as the Dutch Enlightenment. His work encompassed flower and fruit still life paintings, satirical magazines, plays, and biographies of painters ...

who called her a 'Penseel-Prinses' (brush princess). She died in childbirth with her fifteenth baby who was buried with her, and was survived by ten children in the ages 2–22.

References

External links

Aleijda Wolfsen
on

Artnet Artnet.com is an art market website. It is operated by Artnet Worldwide Corporation, which has headquarters in New York City, in the United States, and is owned by Artnet AG, a German publicly traded company based in Berlin that is listed on ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Wolfsen, Aleidja 1648 births 1692 deaths Dutch Golden Age painters People from Zwolle Dutch women painters 17th-century women artists Deaths in childbirth