Pieter Stevensz. van Gunst (1658/9,

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , ; ; ) is the capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, largest city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It has a population of 933,680 in June 2024 within the city proper, 1,457,018 in the City Re ...

- buried 10 November 1732, Amsterdam), also known as Pieter Stevens van Gunst or Petrus Stephani, was a

Dutch Dutch or Nederlands commonly refers to: * Something of, from, or related to the Netherlands ** Dutch people as an ethnic group () ** Dutch nationality law, history and regulations of Dutch citizenship () ** Dutch language () * In specific terms, i ...

draughtsman, copperplate engraver 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 ...

active in Amsterdam,

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(1704), and the Dutch town of Nederhorst (1730-1731).Pieter van Gunst
at the

Netherlands Institute for Art History 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 ...

RKD Research

Life

Not much is known of his life. He was born in Amsterdam in 1658 or 1659 as the son of Steven Hesselsz and Judith Sieuwerts. In 1687 he married in Amsterdam one Leonora Baarselmans from The Hague. In 1712 he joined the Amsterdam book sellers' guild as an art dealer. He was buried on 10 November 1732 in the

Westerkerk The Westerkerk (; ) is a Calvinism, Reformed church within Protestant Church in the Netherlands, Dutch Protestant Calvinism in central Amsterdam, Netherlands. It lies in the most western part of the Grachtengordel (Amsterdam), Grachtengordel nei ...

church in Amsterdam. I.H. van Eeghen
Stevensz. van Gunst en zijn gravures naar portretten van van Dijk', ''Amstelodamum'' 52 (1965), p. 22-25
(Dutch) The engraver

Gilliam van der Gouwen Gilliam van der Gouwen, first name also transcribed as Guilliam and Willem (ca. 1657, Antwerp — buried on 15 March 1716, Amsterdam)psalm The Book of Psalms ( , ; ; ; ; , in Islam also called Zabur, ), also known as the Psalter, is the first book of the third section of the Tanakh (Hebrew Bible) called ('Writings'), and a book of the Old Testament. The book is an anthology of H ...

s set to rhyme, ''CL psalmen des profeeten Davids'', a project which took him 18 years to complete.Van der Aa et al, ''Biographisch Woordenboek der Nederlanden''
(Dutch) A second son called Philipp van Gunst was an etcher/engraver.

Work

Van Gunst produced a number of engravings, mainly portraits, including copies of work by

Anthony van Dyck Sir Anthony van Dyck (; ; 22 March 1599 – 9 December 1641) was a Flemish Baroque painting, Flemish Baroque artist who became the leading court painter in England after success in the Spanish Netherlands and Italy. The seventh child of ...

. He also made a series of illustrations for historical treatises by

Isaac de Larrey Isaac ( ; ; ; ; ; ) is one of the three patriarchs of the Israelites and an important figure in the Abrahamic religions, including Judaism, Christianity, Islam, and the Baháʼí Faith. Isaac first appears in the Torah, in which he is the son of ...

and engravings of drawings by

Gerard de Lairesse Gerard or Gérard (de) Lairesse (; 11 September 1641 – June 1711) was a Dutch Golden Age painter and art theorist. His broad range of skills included music, poetry, and theatre. De Lairesse was influenced by the Perugian Cesare Ripa and ...

to illustrate

Govert Bidloo Govert Bidloo or Govard Bidloo (12 March 1649 – 30 March 1713) was a Dutch Golden Age physician, anatomist, poet and playwright. He was the personal physician of William III of Orange-Nassau, Dutch stadholder and King of England, Scotland ...

's ''Anatomia Humani Corporis''. In 1713-1715 he engraved a set of ten plates after paintings by van Dyck from the collection of

Philip Wharton, 1st Duke of Wharton Philip Wharton, 1st Duke of Wharton Privy Council of Ireland, PC (21 December 1698 – 31 May 1731) was an English peer and Jacobitism, Jacobite politician who was one of the few people in the history of England, and the first since the 15th c ...

. These plates were commissioned by a syndicate of British art dealers (Cock, Comyns and McSwiny), who employed

Jacob Houbraken Jacobus Houbraken (25 December 1698 – 14 November 1780) was a Dutch engraver and the son of the artist and biographer Arnold Houbraken (1660–1719), whom he assisted in producing a published record of the lives of artists from the Dutch Gol ...

to come to Britain in 1713 to make the drawings and van Gunst to engrave them in Amsterdam. The set of ten plates was advertised in the ''

London Gazette London is the capital and largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Western Europe, with a population of 14.9 million. London stands on the River Tha ...

'' on 13 December 1715."Pieter van Gunst, biographical details", British Museum
/ref> Prints of engravings by Van Gunst are in the collections of the

Rijksmuseum The Rijksmuseum () is the national museum of the Netherlands dedicated to Dutch arts and history and is located in Amsterdam. The museum is located at the Museum Square in the borough of Amsterdam South, close to the Van Gogh Museum, the S ...

in Amsterdam,

Museum Boijmans van Beuningen Municipal Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen () is an art museum in Rotterdam in the Netherlands. The name of the museum is derived from its two most important donors, Frans Jacob Otto Boijmans and Daniël George van Beuningen. The museum is located a ...

Rotterdam Rotterdam ( , ; ; ) is the second-largest List of cities in the Netherlands by province, city in the Netherlands after the national capital of Amsterdam. It is in the Provinces of the Netherlands, province of South Holland, part of the North S ...

, the

British Museum The British Museum is a Museum, public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is the largest in the world. It documents the story of human cu ...

and the

National Portrait Gallery National Portrait Gallery may refer to: * National Portrait Gallery (Australia), in Canberra * National Portrait Gallery (Sweden), in Mariefred *National Portrait Gallery (United States), in Washington, D.C. *National Portrait Gallery, London ...

in London, among others.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Gunst, Pieter 1650s births 1732 deaths Engravers from Amsterdam Dutch printmakers Dutch draughtsmen