– 12 May 1723, 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...

) was a Dutch Golden Age

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.

Biography

Voorhout was the son of the Amsterdam clock maker Cornelis Voorhout. Seeing that his son was beter suited to drawing than the technical aspects of watch making, he apprenticed him to Constantijn Verhout in Gouda

Gouda

Gouda is a city and municipality in the western Netherlands, in the province of South Holland. Gouda, which was granted city rights in 1272, is famous for its Gouda cheese, smoking pipes, and 15th-century city hall....

. This Verhout was a painter of modern history scenes, and after 6 years, he moved back to Amsterdam in 1664 to work in the workshop of Jan van Noordt, a history and portrait painter. After working there for 5 years, he married in 1670, and in 1672, worried about a pending invasion by the French, he fled the country and settled in Friedrichstadt

Friedrichstadt

Friedrichstadt is a town in the district of Nordfriesland, in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany. It is situated on the river Eider approx. 12 km south of Husum. It was founded in 1621 by Dutch settlers...

, where his wife had some friends, and he was received by Juriaan Ovens. Ovens wanted him to come work for him, but Voorhout turned down his offer, but followed his advice to try his luck in Hamburg

Hamburg

-History:The first historic name for the city was, according to Claudius Ptolemy's reports, Treva.But the city takes its modern name, Hamburg, from the first permanent building on the site, a castle whose construction was ordered by the Emperor Charlemagne in AD 808...

. There he was quite successful, and that is where his son Johannes was born in 1677.

For Dirck Clant of Groningen, the lord of the Castle Hanckema, Voorhout painted a large portrait of the Stadthouder William III on horseback for him, that was later placed in his castle near Groningen as an over-the-mantel piece. This portrait is now in the Groninger Museum

Groninger Museum

The Groninger Museum is a museum of modern and contemporary art in Groningen, Netherlands.-Background:Although not as well known as other Dutch institutions of fine art, the Groninger Museum was founded in 1894...

 and was later used in the 1930's as a model for the Dutch 500 guilder note.

Later years in Amsterdam

Having heard that the politics of Amsterdam were back to normal, he returned there in 1677, where he started his own workshop. He taught his son Johannes II, and Ernst Stuven

Ernst Stuven

Ernst Stuven was a German Baroque flower painter.-Biography:According to Houbraken, he was born in Hamburg, where he was initially trained by Georg Hainz. At the age of eighteen he moved to Amsterdam , where he became a pupil of Johannes Voorhout, who he knew from Hamburg...

, but never had the success that he had enjoyed in Hamburg. This was partially because he was so productive, that customers couldn't make a choice when they came to his studio, but also it was a result of the market in Amsterdam being much more competitive than in Hamburg, due to the high number of competent painters there. Houbraken ends his biographical sketch of him with the comment that he was perhaps too focussed on painting itself; and spent too little time on commercial interests such as flattery and deception.