Pieter Claesz Soutman (1593-1601 – 16 August 1657)
[Pieter Claesz. Soutman]
in the RKD
The Netherlands Institute for Art History or RKD (Dutch: ), previously Rijksbureau voor Kunsthistorische Documentatie (RKD), is located in The Hague and is home to the largest art history center in the world. The center specializes in document ...
was a
Dutch Golden Age
The Dutch Golden Age ( ) was a period in the history of the Netherlands which roughly lasted from 1588, when the Dutch Republic was established, to 1672, when the '' Rampjaar'' occurred. During this period, Dutch trade, scientific development ...
painter and
printmaker
Printmaking is the process of creating artworks by printing, normally on paper, but also on fabric, wood, metal, and other surfaces. "Traditional printmaking" normally covers only the process of creating prints using a hand processed technique ...
from Haarlem.
Biography
Soutman was born and died in
Haarlem
Haarlem (; predecessor of ''Harlem'' in English language, English) is a List of cities in the Netherlands by province, city and Municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality in the Netherlands. It is the capital of the Provinces of the Nether ...
, where he was a contemporary of
Frans Hals
Frans Hals the Elder (, ; ; – 26 August 1666) was a Dutch Golden Age painter. He lived and worked in Haarlem, a city in which the local authority of the day frowned on religious painting in places of worship but citizens liked to decorate thei ...
,
Hendrick Gerritsz Pot, and
Pieter Claesz
Pieter Claesz (c. 1597 – 1 January 1660) was a Dutch Golden Age painter of still lifes.
Biography
He was born in Berchem, Belgium, near Antwerp, where he became a member of the Guild of St. Luke in 1620. He moved to Haarlem in 1620, where hi ...
, and seems to have been influenced by all three, considering the various attributions of his paintings through the centuries. According to the RKD, he was the youngest of six children of the wealthy Catholic owner of the Haarlem beer brewery ''De Werelt''.
[
According to Houbraken, Soutmann trained with ]Peter Paul Rubens
Sir Peter Paul Rubens ( ; ; 28 June 1577 – 30 May 1640) was a Flemish painting, Flemish artist and diplomat. He is considered the most influential artist of the Flemish Baroque painting, Flemish Baroque tradition. Rubens' highly charged comp ...
in Antwerp
Antwerp (; ; ) is a City status in Belgium, city and a Municipalities of Belgium, municipality in the Flemish Region of Belgium. It is the capital and largest city of Antwerp Province, and the third-largest city in Belgium by area at , after ...
. He must have been successful, because Samuel Ampzing
Samuel Ampzing (24 June 1590 – 29 July 1632) was a Dutch minister, poet and purist.
Biography
Born to the minister Johannes Ampzing in Haarlem, in 1616 Samuel became a minister himself at Rijsoord in Strevelshoek, and in 1619 at the Si ...
mentions him in his poem about Haarlem.[Ampzing states he became the painter of the Prussian majesty due to his fame:Hoe zou hier ook de naam van Soutman zyn verzwegen,
Die door zyn kloek penceel, zig heeft dien staat verkregen,
Zig heeft door zyne Konst die eer en roem bereit,
Dat hy de Schilder is der Pruische Majesteit.] Probably during Prince Władysław Vasa's visit to Antwerp in 1624, he was recommended by Rubens as an excellent painter.[ ] That same year he went to Poland, where he was appointed royal court painter.Sigismund III Vasa
Sigismund III Vasa (, ; 20 June 1566 – 30 April 1632
N.S.) was King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania from 1587 to 1632 and, as Sigismund, King of Sweden from 1592 to 1599. He was the first Polish sovereign from the House of Vasa. Re ...
until 1628, when he returned to Haarlem. His family connections enabled him to become affiliated with the Catholic Hofje Codde en Van Beresteijn. Today this is one hofje, but in his day it was two; the Hofje of Codde and the Hofje of Beresteijn. He was probably regent of the Codde hofje. Soutman became a respected portrait painter in Haarlem and won many commissions for group portraits, including lucrative '' schutterstukken''.
Legacy
One of his portraits that he painted for the Beresteijn family (regents of both the Beresteijn and Codde hofjes) was later sold as a Frans Hals
Frans Hals the Elder (, ; ; – 26 August 1666) was a Dutch Golden Age painter. He lived and worked in Haarlem, a city in which the local authority of the day frowned on religious painting in places of worship but citizens liked to decorate thei ...
to the Louvre
The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is a national art museum in Paris, France, and one of the most famous museums in the world. It is located on the Rive Droite, Right Bank of the Seine in the city's 1st arrondissement of Paris, 1st arron ...
in the 1860s, but this was not from deception, but ignorance on the part of the hofje regents. This sale was considered a scandal in the Dutch press at the time, and Conrad Busken Huet wrote that the government should keep this national treasure in the country (he was living in Haarlem at the time).
Soutman's work hangs today in various museums, and in the Huis ten Bosch
Huis ten Bosch (, ; ) is a royal palace in The Hague, Netherlands. It is one of three official residences of the Dutch monarch; the two others being the Noordeinde Palace in The Hague and the Royal Palace of Amsterdam.
Huis ten Bosch was th ...
in The Hague
The Hague ( ) is the capital city of the South Holland province of the Netherlands. With a population of over half a million, it is the third-largest city in the Netherlands. Situated on the west coast facing the North Sea, The Hague is the c ...
. His pupils were Cornelis Visscher, Jacob Louys (1595-na 1635), and Pieter van Sompel.
See also
* Peter Danckerts de Rij, another Dutch Golden Age painter at the Polish court.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Soutman, Pieter
1590s births
1657 deaths
Dutch Golden Age painters
Dutch male painters
Court painters of Polish kings
Dutch expatriates in Poland
Painters from Haarlem
Pupils of Peter Paul Rubens