Peter Candid

1548 – 1628

Flemish painter (originally Pieter de Witte), tapestry designer and draughtsman, active in Italy and Germany. He was one of several Italian-trained Mannerist artists employed by the courts of Europe and was the leading figure in Munich from 1600 to 1628. His versatility led Sandrart to describe him as a 'universal painter'. When he was about ten years old he emigrated to Florence with his parents - his father, Pieter de Witte (active c. 1547-62), being a tapestry weaver who found employment in the Medici tapestry factory founded in 1546. Between 1572 and 1573 he worked with Giorgio Vasari on the frescoes of the Sala Regia in the Vatican. He also painted a number of large, grand altarpieces in Volterra. The family name later changed to Candido, but the son was usually called Candid north of the Alps, where he returned in 1586. Very little is known about him as a person, and there is no portrait of him. He married and had five children, including a son Wilhelm (active 1613-25), who was a painter though he later (1625) became a court Silberdiener, and a daughter who married the engraver Filips Sadeler in 1624.

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