Hendrick Cornelisz Vroom
Encyclopedia
Dutch Golden Age
The Golden Age was a period in Dutch history, roughly spanning the 17th century, in which Dutch trade, science, military and art were among the most acclaimed in the world. The first half is characterised by the Eighty Years' War till 1648...
painter credited with being the founder of Dutch
Netherlands
The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...
marine art
Marine art
Marine art or maritime art is any form of figurative art that portrays or draws its main inspiration from the sea. Maritime painting is a genre that depicts ships and the sea—a genre particularly strong from the 17th to 19th centuries...
or seascape painting. Beginning with the "birds-eye" viewpoint of earlier Netherlandish marine art, his later works show a view from lower down, and more realistic depiction of the seas themselves. He is not to be confused with his son and pupil Cornelis Vroom
Cornelis Vroom
Cornelis Hendriksz Vroom was a Dutch Golden Age landscape painter.-Biography:According to the RKD he was the son of the painter Hendrick Cornelisz Vroom, the older brother of Frederick and Jacob, and the father of the painter Jacob Cornelisz Vroom. He became a member of the Haarlem Guild of St...
.
Biography
Schilder-boeck
The Schilder-Boeck is a book by the art historian Karel van Mander written in 1604. It was actually compiled from three books in total; the first was a translation from Giorgio Vasari's list of artist biographies called the Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, the...
", which reads as an adventure story, complete with freezing his pants to a mountain top and nearly starving to death on a rock with a group that discussed cannibalism as a possible survival strategy.
Though it is unknown at what age he started on his travels, Vroom was born into a family of artists and began his career as a pottery (faience
Faience
Faience or faïence is the conventional name in English for fine tin-glazed pottery on a delicate pale buff earthenware body, originally associated with Faenza in northern Italy. The invention of a white pottery glaze suitable for painted decoration, by the addition of an oxide of tin to the slip...
) painter and when his mother remarried, was no older than 19 when he rebelled against his stepfather who insisted he stick to pottery painting, by boarding a ship for Spain (Sevilla) and from thence via Livorno
Livorno
Livorno , traditionally Leghorn , is a port city on the Tyrrhenian Sea on the western edge of Tuscany, Italy. It is the capital of the Province of Livorno, having a population of approximately 160,000 residents in 2009.- History :...
and Florence
Florence
Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with approximately 370,000 inhabitants, expanding to over 1.5 million in the metropolitan area....
to Rome. In Florence
Florence
Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with approximately 370,000 inhabitants, expanding to over 1.5 million in the metropolitan area....
he was patronized around 1585–87 by Cardinal Ferdinando de' Medici
Ferdinando de' Medici
Ferdinando de' Medici may refer to various members of the Medici ruling family of Tuscany:* Ferdinando I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany, , Grand Duke of Tuscany 1587–1609...
, later Grand Duke of Tuscany. While there he became a pupil of Paulus Bril. He went back and forth to Venice
Venice
Venice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...
, where he earned money as a majolica
Majolica
Majolica, an English version of the Italian word maiolica, is a term covering a wide variety of European tin-glazed pottery, typically brightly painted over an opaque white background glaze, with an earthenware body....
painter. When he returned north, he travelled via Milan, Genoa, Albisola (a ceramics center where he again earned money painting ceramics), Turin (where he met the Haarlem painter Jan Kraeck), and Lyon (via a mountain pass where his pants froze to the summit rock). From there he travelled to Paris, where he met a painter from Leiden, and from there he went to Rouen
Rouen
Rouen , in northern France on the River Seine, is the capital of the Haute-Normandie region and the historic capital city of Normandy. Once one of the largest and most prosperous cities of medieval Europe , it was the seat of the Exchequer of Normandy in the Middle Ages...
, where he became mortally ill but was saved by a woman who bandaged his head. There he boarded a ship homewards and was back in Haarlem in 1590, the year he married, before travelling to Danzig (now Gdansk
Gdansk
Gdańsk is a Polish city on the Baltic coast, at the centre of the country's fourth-largest metropolitan area.The city lies on the southern edge of Gdańsk Bay , in a conurbation with the city of Gdynia, spa town of Sopot, and suburban communities, which together form a metropolitan area called the...
) to visit his uncle, Frederick Henricksz, who was city architect there, and where he painted an altarpiece. During his next journey, this time to Portugal, he survived shipwreck and possibly murder as "an English pirate" by being recognized as a Catholic from his salvaged devotional paintings that convinced the monks on the beach that he and his companions were not heathen Protestants (Vroom, having been to Italy, had coached his fellow survivors in the catechism). Having been granted free passage, Vroom travelled to St. Huves (Setubal
Setúbal
Setúbal is the main city in Setúbal Municipality in Portugal with a total area of 172.0 km² and a total population of 118,696 inhabitants in the municipality. The city proper has 89,303 inhabitants....
), where he recorded his adventures in a painting that he sold to a painter there. When he decided to return to Haarlem, he got off the ship at the last minute due to a premonition, being called a "crazy painter". That ship sunk in the Øresund near Helsingor and Vroom was reported dead in Haarlem. Fortunately he wrote to his wife, who thus discovered he was still alive.
Tapestry designs
When he did return to Haarlem, it was as an artist of international repute and soon afterwards he received two commissions for tapestry designs, one of which, from Lord Howard of Effingham, was for a series of ten tapestries depicting the defeat of the Spanish ArmadaSpanish Armada
This article refers to the Battle of Gravelines, for the modern navy of Spain, see Spanish NavyThe Spanish Armada was the Spanish fleet that sailed against England under the command of the Duke of Medina Sidonia in 1588, with the intention of overthrowing Elizabeth I of England to stop English...
of 1588, by the English under Howard’s overall command as Lord Admiral. Executed in Brussels
Brussels
Brussels , officially the Brussels Region or Brussels-Capital Region , is the capital of Belgium and the de facto capital of the European Union...
in 1592–95, the tapestries later decorated the House of Lords
House of Lords
The House of Lords is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminster....
, Westminster, and were fortunately recorded in engravings before they were destroyed by fire in 1834.
Legacy
Vroom recorded important engagements of the Dutch and English fleets in his oil paintings, giving a detailed portrayal of ships. Most of the pieces described by Van Mander are lost, and his greatest commissions were obtained after Van Mander's death. Vroom's large and decorative battles, ceremonial scenes and beach views introduced novel compositional devices to be taken up by younger Dutch marinists. The Haarlem marine painters Hans GoderisHans Goderis
Hans Goderis was a Dutch Golden Age painter from Haarlem.-Biography:He is first mentioned along with Cornelis Verbeeck in the book Harlemias by Theodorus Schrevelius as choosing marine painting....
, Cornelis Verbeeck
Cornelis Verbeeck
Cornelis Verbeeck , also known as Cornelis Verbeecq, was a Dutch Golden Age painter from Haarlem.-Biography:He is first mentioned along with Hans Goderis in the book Harlemias by Theodorus Schrevelius as choosing marine painting....
and Cornelis Claesz van Wieringen
Cornelis Claesz van Wieringen
Cornelis Claesz van Wieringen was a Dutch Golden Age painter.-Biography:He was the son of a Haarlem captain, and drew, painted and etched with his friends Hendrick Goltzius and Cornelis van Haarlem. He also held important positions in the Haarlem Guild of St...
were all directly influenced by him. He became a member of the Haarlem Guild of St. Luke
Haarlem Guild of St. Luke
The Haarlem Guild of Saint Luke was first a Christian, and later a city Guild for a large number of trades falling under the patron saints Luke the Evangelist and Saint Eligius.-History:...
and his pupils included Aert Anthonisz, Nicolaes de Kemp, Jan Porcellis
Jan Porcellis
Jan Porcellis was a Dutch marine artist.Porcellis was born in Ghent. He was the father of the marine artist Julius Porcellis , and is generally agreed to be the more fluent artist, particularly in his sense of space and his tonal palette...
, and his sons Cornelis Hendriksz Vroom and Frederik Hendricksz Vroom.
Works
Among his more famous historical scenes included the 1607 Battle of GibraltarBattle of Gibraltar
The naval Battle of Gibraltar took place on 25 April 1607 during the Eighty Years' War when a Dutch fleet surprised and engaged a Spanish fleet anchored at the Bay of Gibraltar. During the four hours of action, most of the Spanish fleet was destroyed....
and the arrival of various dignitaries in Amsterdam
Amsterdam
Amsterdam is the largest city and the capital of the Netherlands. The current position of Amsterdam as capital city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands is governed by the constitution of August 24, 1815 and its successors. Amsterdam has a population of 783,364 within city limits, an urban population...
, including Protestant leader Frederick V, Elector Palatine
Frederick V, Elector Palatine
Frederick V was Elector Palatine , and, as Frederick I , King of Bohemia ....
of Bohemia
Bohemia
Bohemia is a historical region in central Europe, occupying the western two-thirds of the traditional Czech Lands. It is located in the contemporary Czech Republic with its capital in Prague...
who had been exiled by the Holy Roman Emperor
Holy Roman Emperor
The Holy Roman Emperor is a term used by historians to denote a medieval ruler who, as German King, had also received the title of "Emperor of the Romans" from the Pope...
.
External links
- Vroom at the Web Gallery of Art
- Works and literature on PubHist
- Hendrick Cornelisz Vroom on ArtnetArtnetartnet is an online service provider for the international art market with headquarters in New York, Berlin and Paris. Additionally, artnet has regional offices in China, the UK and Russia.- Business model :...