Lucas van Valkenborch (c. 1535 - 2 February 1597) was a member of a family of Flemish

Flanders

Flanders is the community of the Flemings but also one of the institutions in Belgium, and a geographical region located in parts of present-day Belgium, France and the Netherlands. "Flanders" can also refer to the northern part of Belgium that contains Brussels, Bruges, Ghent and Antwerp...

 Renaissance landscape

Landscape art

Landscape art is a term that covers the depiction of natural scenery such as mountains, valleys, trees, rivers, and forests, and especially art where the main subject is a wide view, with its elements arranged into a coherent composition. In other works landscape backgrounds for figures can still...

 and genre painters.

Biography

Van Valckenborch was born in Leuven

Leuven

Leuven is the capital of the province of Flemish Brabant in the Flemish Region, Belgium...

. According to Karel van Mander, he learned to paint landscapes in Mechelen, which was known as a center for oil and water-colours and especially landscape painting. At the time of the Beeldenstorm

Beeldenstorm

Beeldenstorm in Dutch, roughly translatable to "statue storm", or Bildersturm in German , also the Iconoclastic Fury, is a term used for outbreaks of destruction of religious images that occurred in Europe in the 16th century...

 in 1566 he left town with Marten van Valckenborch

Marten van Valckenborch

Marten van Valckenborch , was a Flemish Renaissance painter.-Biography:According to Karel van Mander he learned to paint landscapes in Mechelen, which was known as a center for oil and water-colours and especially landscape painting...

 and they made a trip from Luik to Aachen

Aachen

Aachen has historically been a spa town in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. Aachen was a favoured residence of Charlemagne, and the place of coronation of the Kings of Germany. Geographically, Aachen is the westernmost town of Germany, located along its borders with Belgium and the Netherlands, ...

 along the Meuse (river), painting river valley views. When William the Silent

William the Silent

William I, Prince of Orange , also widely known as William the Silent , or simply William of Orange , was the main leader of the Dutch revolt against the Spanish that set off the Eighty Years' War and resulted in the formal independence of the United Provinces in 1648. He was born in the House of...

 turned against the Spanish, they returned to the Netherlands, where they made many small clever pieces that sold well. Lucas, who could paint figures just as easily as landscapes, then became patronized by Matthias, Holy Roman Emperor

Matthias, Holy Roman Emperor

Matthias of Austria was Holy Roman Emperor from 1612, King of Hungary and Croatia from 1608 and King of Bohemia from 1611...

 and travelled with him down the Danube

Danube

The Danube is a river in the Central Europe and the Europe's second longest river after the Volga. It is classified as an international waterway....

 as far as Linz

Linz

Linz is the third-largest city of Austria and capital of the state of Upper Austria . It is located in the north centre of Austria, approximately south of the Czech border, on both sides of the river Danube. The population of the city is , and that of the Greater Linz conurbation is about...

, and made many works for him until the Turks invaded Hungary.

According to the RKD he was the cousin of the painters Frederik and Gillis van Valckenborch

Gillis van Valckenborch

Gillis van Valckenborch , was a Flemish Baroque painter.-Biography:According to the RKD he was the son of the painter Marten van Valckenborch, the brother of the painter Frederik van Valckenborch, and the nephew of the painter Lucas van Valckenborch...

, and the nephew of the painter Marten van Valckenborch (though they were close in age). He is known for landscapes and still-lifes, as well as architectural studies. He became the teacher of Georg Flegel

Georg Flegel

Georg Flegel was a German painter, best known for his still life works.Flegel was born in Olmütz , Moravia. Around 1580 he moved to Vienna, where he became a assistant to Lucas van Valckenborch I, a painter and draughtsman. Flegel and his employer later moved to Frankfurt, which at the time was an...

.
He died in Frankfurt am Main.

Works

• Landscape in Spring
• Landscape in Summer
• Landscape with a Rural Festival
• The Massacre of the Innocents
• Mountainous Landscape
• Rocky Landscape
• The Tower of Babel
• View of Antwerp with the Frozen Schelde
• View of Huy from Ahin

Curiosities

Lucas van Valkenborch is mentioned by the German writer W. G. Sebald

W. G. Sebald

W. G. Maximilian Sebald was a German writer and academic. At the time of his death at the age of 57, he was being cited by many literary critics as one of the greatest living authors and had been tipped as a possible future winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature...

 in his book Austerlitz describing the painting View of Antwerp with the Frozen Schelde (1590).

External links

• Lucas van Valckenborch from Artcyclopedia.
• Lucas van Valckenborch paintings from Web Gallery of Art.
• Lucas van Valckenborch on Artnet
  Artnet
  artnet 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 :...