Object data
oil on panel
support: height 220.3 cm × width 143.5 cm
sight size: height 218.2 cm × width 141.7 cm
Michiel Jansz van Mierevelt
c. 1613 - c. 1620
oil on panel
support: height 220.3 cm × width 143.5 cm
sight size: height 218.2 cm × width 141.7 cm
The original support consists of six vertically grained planks and a strip of wood 2.4 cm wide on the left side as seen from the front. The support is not bevelled. Dendrochronology has shown that the youngest heartwood ring was formed in 1602. The panel could have been ready for use by 1613, but a date in or after 1619 is more likely. The beige ground layer was left visible in the shield, Maurits’s collar and here and there in the curtain. There is a minimum of visible brushmarking. Glazes were used for the shadows of the tablecloth and the curtain.
Fair. There are four old cracks in the panel and a few areas of minor abrasion.
...; first recorded in the museum in 1801;1 on loan to the Oranje-Nassau Museum, The Hague, 1926-32
Object number: SK-A-255
Copyright: Public domain
Michiel Jansz van Mierevelt (Delft 1567 - Delft 1641)
According to Van Mander, Michiel Jansz van Mierevelt or Miereveld (he used both forms) was born in Delft on 1 May 1567. He was the son of the successful goldsmith Jan Michielsz van Mierevelt, and received his early training in Delft from two otherwise unknown artists, Willem Willemsz and a pupil of Antonie Blocklandt whom Van Mander simply calls Augustijn. Van Mierevelt became a pupil of Blocklandt’s in Utrecht, presumably in 1581 at the age of 14, for a period of two years and three months. From Blocklandt he learned to handle paint and became accomplished in the art of history painting. After his master’s death, Van Mierevelt returned to his native town, where he joined the painters’ guild in 1587 and served as warden in 1589-90 and 1611-12. He married twice, in 1589 and 1633.
Much to the regret of his father, Van Mierevelt abandoned history painting in favour of the more lucrative genre of portraiture, first adhering to the style of his fellow townsman Jacob Willemsz Delff. However, few of his early portraits have survived, even fewer of his history paintings, and none at all of the kitchen pieces reported by Van Mander. In general, Van Mierevelt’s portraits show great attention to detail and little compositional adventure. His later paintings, however, are more animated, loosely painted productions.
Van Mierevelt’s enormous output (Houbraken says 5,000 portraits, Von Sandrart 10,000) began in earnest with the 1607 commission from the Delft authorities to portray the stadholder, Prince Maurits.2 In the same year, he became the official painter to the Stadholder’s Court in The Hague, a position he enjoyed for about a quarter of a century until Honthorst usurped it. In addition to his base clientele in The Hague and Delft, his workshop was regularly frequented by aristocrats and patricians from other Dutch and foreign cities. The large demand was met in part by Van Mierevelt’s assistants, who included his sons Pieter (1596-1623) and Jan (1604-33). The inventory of his shop reveals that he kept a supply of replicas of his most famous sitters on hand. His inventions were also disseminated through the reproductive engravings made by his son-in-law, Willem Jacobsz Delff (1580-1638). Van Mierevelt’s most important pupils were Paulus Moreelse (c. 1571-1638), Willem van der Vliet (c. 1584-1642), Daniel Mijtens (c. 1590-1647) and Anthonie Palamedesz (1601-73). Van Mierevelt died a wealthy man in 1641. His lucrative workshop was taken over by his grandson, Jacob Willemsz Delff (1619-61).
Jonathan Bikker, 2007
References
Van Mander 1604, fols. 281-82; Von Sandrart 1675 (1925), pp. 124, 171-72; Houbraken I, 1718, pp. 46-49; Obreen I, 1877-78, p. 4; Havard I, 1879, pp. 11-82; Obreen III, 1880-81, p. 263; Havard 1894; Bredius 1908 (documents); Gerson in Thieme/Becker XXIV, 1930, p. 539; Montias 1982, pp. 38, 370; Ekkart in Amsterdam 1993, pp. 310-11; Ekkart in Turner 1996, pp. 485-86
Prince Maurits was the second son of William the Silent. His mother was Anna of Saxony (1544-77), William the Silent’s second wife. After his father’s assassination in Delft in 1584, Maurits became chairman of the Council of State. The following year, 1585, he was appointed Stadholder of Holland and Zeeland and head of the army. He was granted the title Prince of Orange in 1618, after the death of his half-brother, Philips Willem. Maurits never married and died on 23 April 1625.
Van Mierevelt’s earliest portrait of Prince Maurits is a three-quarter length depiction commissioned by the Delft city fathers in 1607.3 In the same year, Van Mierevelt became court painter to Maurits, and was granted the exclusive right to reproduce the prince’s image in print for a period of six years.4 Although the Delft artist and his studio would produce numerous portraits of Maurits, the prince probably posed only the one time in 1607.5 Based on the apparent age of the sitter, Ekkart regarded the portrait of Maurits in the collection of the Duke of Grafton6 as Van Mierevelt’s first full-length depiction of the prince.7 Moore, however, had considered this portrait to be an autograph repetition, with differences, of the Rijksmuseum painting,8 and, in the most recent literature, the latter has been called the first full-length portrait of Maurits.9 In both pictures, the sitter has been placed diagonally in the composition in more or less the same pose as the 1607 portrait.
The composition of these portraits of Prince Maurits as a military commander is ultimately derived from Titian’s portraits of Charles V and Philip II, and was first exploited in the Netherlands by Antonio Moro.10 In the Rijksmuseum painting, the position of the table differs from that in the Duke of Grafton’s picture, and curtains cover the entire background, not just the upper right corner. As the latter motif was most probably associated with the Roman imperial baldachin,11 it is probably not coincidental that the curtains form a canopy over Maurits in the Rijksmuseum picture. The Duke of Grafton’s picture also differs from the present work in that a column is shown on the left instead of a shield. This so-called ‘Roman’ shield or targe was designed by Maurits himself and executed by his official shield-maker Jacob Dirckxz de Swart.12
In all three portraits of Maurits under discussion here, the prince wears the ceremonial gilt suit of armour decorated with laurel leaves that was presented to him after the Battle of Nieuwpoort (1600) by the States-General. The prince also wears an orange sash, and in the 1607 painting and the one in the Rijksmuseum a medal of the Order of the Garter. Maurits was awarded this medal by James I in 1613, and it must have been added to his 1607 portrait around that time. The fact that the medal is not present in the Duke of Grafton’s picture supports Ekkart’s argument that that painting was executed before the Rijksmuseum one and is, indeed, the earliest known full-length representation of Prince Maurits. Because of the presence of the medal, the Rijksmuseum painting must date from 1613 or thereafter. The latest possible date suggested by Ekkart, 1620, is acceptable as a terminus ante quem. A dating between 1613 and 1620 is also supported by the dendrochronology.13
The dating of this portrait to 1613 or later argues against the traditional notion that it was commissioned by the States-General.14 Van Mierevelt did donate a portrait of Prince Maurits to the States-General for which he was paid 300 guilders, but that was in 1608.15 A portrait of Maurits, moreover, was transferred from the States-General to the Senate in the 19th century where it still hangs.16 The notion, first advanced by Moes and Van Biema, that the present painting entered the Nationale Konst-Gallery in The Hague from the Admiralty of the Maas in 1800 is also incorrect, as Van Thiel has shown.17 It is unlikely that the painting came from Paleis Het Loo, however, as has been suggested by Van Thiel, for no such portrait is listed in the 1757 estate inventory.18
Jonathan Bikker, 2007
See Bibliography and Rijksmuseum painting catalogues
See Key to abbreviations and Acknowledgements
This entry was published in J. Bikker (ed.), Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth Century in the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, I: Artists Born between 1570 and 1600, coll. cat. Amsterdam 2007, no. 184.
Ekkart in Amsterdam 1993, pp. 592-93, no. 265; Zandvliet in Amsterdam 2000a, pp. 267-69, no. 125
1801, p. 47, no. 2; 1809, p. 46, no. 196; 1843, p. 40, no. 202 (‘has suffered badly’); 1853, p. 18, no. 175 (fl. 2,000); 1858, pp. 193-94, no. 193; 1880, p. 204, no. 220; 1887, p. 110, no. 923; 1903, p. 175, no. 1581; 1934, p. 187, no. 1581; 1960, p. 205, no. 1581; 1976, p. 383, no. A 255; 2007, no. 184
J. Bikker, 2007, 'Michiel Jansz. van Mierevelt, Portrait of Maurits (1567-1625), Prince of Orange, c. 1613 - c. 1620', in J. Bikker (ed.), Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth Century in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: hdl.handle.net/10934/RM0001.COLLECT.6738
(accessed 8 November 2024 21:53:11).