Jan Jozef II Horemans

1714 – 1790

Flemish painter, son of Jan Josef Horemans I. He qualified as a master of the Guild of St Luke in Antwerp on 10 February 1767 and was dean of the Guild on two occasions (1768-69 and 1775-76). He was a placid apologist for bourgeois virtues and, following his father's example, admirably recreated the atmosphere of his age in a multitude of small paintings that are pleasantly animated and have an old-fashioned charm. He also signed in the same way as his father, but his style was more distinguished and sensitive and his palette lighter (earning him the nickname "le Clair" that distinguishes him from his father "le Sombre"). Works such as the Musical Company, the Interior with Figures (both Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum), The Minuet (Geneva, Musée d'Art et d'Histoire) and the Portrait of a Family (1772; Utrecht, Centraal Museum) combine traditional genre painting with the 18th-century conversation piece. Jan Josef II sometimes incorporated into his own compositions figures taken unchanged from David Teniers the Younger or Hieronymus Janssens, as in the New Neighbours (Worcester, Art Museum). He also occasionally painted interior decorations, such as the wall panels of The Seasons (private collection), and accepted a number of official commissions, such as the Entry of Charles of Lorraine into Antwerp in 1749 (Antwerp, Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten). He was still exhibiting paintings in Antwerp in 1790.

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