River View

Johannes Schoeff (? Antwerp 1608/09 - ? Bergen op Zoom, in or after 1666)

Johannes Schoeff (who is also called Schooff or Schuyff in the archives) gave his age as roughly 30 on his marriage in 1639 and was 52 in 1660, so he was presumably born in 1608 or 1609. His place of birth was probably Antwerp, for a Johannes Schoeff is listed as an apprentice in the archives of the city's Guild of St Luke. There is no information on who his teacher was. In 1639 he is mentioned as living in The Hague with his father, Pieter Schoeff, who was a jeweller, and two years later he received his citizenship there. His neighbour was the artist Jan van Goyen. Schoeff’s earliest known dated work was made in 1640.¹ His name occurs frequently in notarized records. In 1647 he and Van Goyen took part in a large auction of paintings in The Hague, and it emerges from various documents that Schoeff and his father dealt in art. In 1659, for instance, Jan Miense Molenaer lodged a claim against the partnership of Schoeff and his late father for 150 guilders for paintings delivered.

Schoeff married twice, in 1639 to Cornelia Melaenen and ten years later to Anna Mailliaers, who hailed from Antwerp. In 1651 he stayed for some time in a manor house called Stabroek near Antwerp, which he inherited from his father some years later. According to a notarized file drawn up after the latter’s death the artist also lived in France and the village of Werkendam in North Brabant. Schoeff and his wife moved in or before 1656 to Bergen op Zoom, where he acquired citizenship and probably remained for the rest of his life. Documents show that he was regularly involved in real estate deals and that he retained ties with Antwerp.

Schoeff fell seriously ill in 1664, and on 17 October he drew up his will, in which he left prints and all the sketches made by his wife’s brother-in-law, the Antwerp artist Michiel van der Haagen, to his son. In April 1665 Schoeff and Anna Mailliaers signed an acknowledgement of debt of 500 guilders to the Middelburg physician Johannes Larore, who received 17 paintings that he could sell to pay off the arrears. It is not known when or where Schoeff died, but he is recorded in Bergen op Zoom for the last time on 5 April 1666. His wife is referred to as a widow in 1681, when she was living in The Hague. Schoeff’s last dated picture is from 1662.²

Schoeff was a true landscape specialist, and chiefly produced panoramic views of dunes and rivers, many of which recall the work of Jan van Goyen and Salomon van Ruysdael. Much of his output was attributed to better known contemporaries down the years. There is documentary evidence that in 1664-65 he had a pupil called Jan Baptist van der Moesen lodging with him.

Gerdien Wuestman, 2024

References
P. Rombouts and T. van Lerius, De Liggeren en andere historische archieven der Antwerpsche Sint Lucasgilde, onder zinspreuk ‘Wt jonsten versaemt’, I, Antwerp/The Hague 1864, p. 584; A. Bredius, ‘Aus den haager Archiven’, Kunstchronik 17 (1882), cols. 553-55, 573-75, 667-68, 686-89, 747-50, esp. cols. 553-55; A. Bredius, Künstler-Inventare, II, The Hague 1916, pp. 457-70; ibid., VII, 1921, p. 159; Bredius and Batowski in U. Thieme and F. Becker (eds.), Allgemeines Lexikon der bildenden Künstler von der Antike bis zur Gegenwart, XXX, Leipzig 1936, p. 215; H.-U. Beck, Künstler um Jan van Goyen: Maler und Zeichner, Doornspijk 1991, p. 390; Buijsen in E. Buijsen et al., Haagse schilders in de Gouden Eeuw: Het Hoogsteder Lexicon van alle schilders werkzaam in Den Haag 1600-1700, exh. cat. The Hague (Haags Historisch Museum) 1998-99, p. 345; A. van der Willigen, Dictionary of Dutch and Flemish Landscape and Marine Painters Working in Oils, Active before 1725 (unpub. typescript from 1993-98, with additions by M. de Kinkelder, RKD); Bredius notes, RKD