Man Holding a Mirror up to his Wife’s Face

Adriaen van de Venne (Delft, c. 1589 – The Hague 1622)

He was the son of Pieter van de Venne (?-1594) and Jannetgen Beunincx (?-?) and grew up in Delft and Middelburg. He studied Latin and received training in painting and illustration from the otherwise unknown artists Simon de Valck (?-?) and Hieronymous van Diest (?-?).² In 1614, while still in Middelburg, he married Elisabeth de Pours (?-1655), with whom he had three children who reached maturity: Maria van de Venne (?-c. 1650), Pieter van de Venne (1624-1657) and Huybert van der Venne (c. 1635-c. 1692).³ Both surviving sons became painters.

In 1618, Adriaen’s brother Jan Pietersz. van de Venne (?-after 1625) opened a shop selling paintings and set up a publishing business in which Adriaen played an important role as print designer, poet and illustrator. They published several propaganda prints supporting the House of Orange and the Elector Palatine Frederick V (1596-1632). Adriaen’s illustrations were celebrated for their focus on the human figure and their combination of clear narrative and informal composition. The brothers also contributed greatly towards the popularity of Dutch emblem books in the seventeenth century. They collaborated with the leading writers of their time, including Jacob Cats (1577-1660), Constantijn Huygens I (1596-1687) and Johannes de Brune (1588-1658).⁴

Van de Venne is first documented in The Hague on 22 March 1625.⁵ There, he continued to work for the House of Orange. Among his earliest works there were the prints and paintings of Prince Maurits lying in state, several impressions of which were ordered by the States-General on 21 July 1625. Van de Venne enrolled in the Guild of St Luke in the same year, and acquired his Hague citizenship in 1626. In the same year, he completed an album of 105 miniatures in 1626, now in the British Museum, London (inv. no. 1978,0624.42.1), probably commissioned by Frederick V of the Palatinate. The album with brightly coloured drawings is entitled tLants sterckte (‘Fortress and strength of the land’) and was intended as a gift to the new Stadholder Frederick Henry (1584-1647). It celebrates his rule, country and people of all levels of society.⁶

Van de Venne was warden of the Guild of St Luke in The Hague from 1631 to 1633 and from 1637 to 1639; he filled the post of dean from 1639 to 1641.⁷ He was also a member of the Ionghe Batavieren (Young Batavians) chamber of rhetoric. In 1656, Van de Venne was involved in setting up a new confraternity, the Confrerie Pictura, which broke away from the Guild of St Luke. At the end of his life, he ran into financial difficulties. He made his will in 1660 after falling ill, and died on 12 November 1662.

Jonathan Bikker, 2007/Carolyn Mensing, 2020

References
C. de Bie, Het gulden cabinet vande edele vry schilder-const, Antwerp 1661, pp. 234–36; A. Houbraken, De groote schouburgh der Nederlantsche konstschilders en schilderessen, 3 vols., Amsterdam 1718-21, I (1718), pp. 136-47; D. Franken, Adriaen van de Venne, Amsterdam, 1878; U. Thieme and F. Becker, Allgemeines Lexikon der bildenden Künstler: Von der Antike bis zur Gegenwart, 37 vols., Leipzig 1907-50, XXXIX (1926), p. 213; L.J. Bol: ‘Adriaen Pietersz. van de Venne, schilder en teyckenaer’, Tableau 5 (1982-83), nos. 2–6; 6 (1983-84), nos. 1–5; P.C. Sutton et al., Masters of 17th-century Dutch Landscape Painting, exh. cat. Amsterdam (Rijksmuseum)/Boston (Museum of Fine Arts)/Philadelphia (Museum of Art) 1987-88, pp. 503-07; M. Royalton-Kisch, Adriaen van de Venne’s Album in the British Museum, London 1988; L.J. Bol, Adriaen Pietersz. van de Venne: Painter and Draughtsman, Doornspijk 1989; M. Royalton-Kish, ‘Venne, Adriaen (Pietersz.) van de’, in J. Turner (ed.), The Dictionary of Art, 34 vols., London/New York 1996, XXXII, pp. 230-32, https://doi.org/10.1093/gao/9781884446054.article.T088698, accessed 17 August 2021; E. Buijsen, ‘Roodkrijttekeningen naar schilderijen van Adriaen van de Venne en hun mogelijke functie’, Oud Holland 118 (2005), pp. 131-202