Andries van Eertvelt

1590 – 1652

Flemish painter. He enrolled as a member of Antwerp's Guild of St Luke in 1609. In 1615 he married Catherine Vlieger (d. 1627), after whose death he went to Genoa, where he worked for Cornelis de Wael. By c. 1630 he was back in Antwerp, where he had his portrait painted by Anthony van Dyck (1632; Schaezlerpalais, Augsburg). In 1633 Eertvelt married Elisabeth Boots, probably a daughter of the Antwerp painter Jan Boots (b. before 1620). Eertvelt is regarded as the first Flemish marine painter. Over the years his palette and style changed. His first paintings, mostly of ships in storms (e.g. Sea Battle in a Storm; Staatliches Museum, Schwerin), were painted in greenish-black and brown tones, often using white to highlight the rigging against the dark sea. After his tour of Italy he favoured views of southern harbours, with calm seas painted in soft tones (e.g. Spanish Ships Leaving a Port; Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna). In his day Eertvelt was a man of distinction whose artistic qualities were praised by the poet Cornelis de Bie and whose marine paintings were appreciated abroad, some being exported as far as Seville and Lisbon. His pupils included Gaspard van Eyck, Hendrik Minderhout and Matthieu van Plattenberg.

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