Painting

   In the cities of the northern parts of the Low Countries, painters were already active during the Middle Ages. Haarlem, Leiden, and ’s Hertogenbosch were centers of the arts in the 15th century, with painters such as Geertgen tot Sint Jans (c. 1460–c. 1495), Jeroen Bosch (c. 1450–1516), and several anonymous “mas ters.” Their clients were clergymen and monasteries and people from the urban elites. During the 16th century, the era of the Protes tant Reformation, artists such as Lucas van Leyden (1494–1533), Jan van Scorel (1495–1562), and Maerten van Heemskerck (1498–1574) excelled.

   The civil war and the Dutch Revoltagainst Spain led many Protes tants from Flanders and other southern provinces to immigrate to the North, where a new Calvinist Republic was born. These people brought wealth, intellect, know-how, and artistic feeling with them. The wealthy merchants in the numerous cities of the Republic (espe cially in Holland) commissioned large paintings depicting religious or historical scenes. They bought portraits, but also smaller genre paintings. The city magistrates employed architectsand sculptors for the new town halls. Frans Hals (1580/85–1666), Rembrandt van Rijn, Jan Steen (1625/1626–1679), Johannes Vermeer (1632–1675), and Judith Leyster are only a few of the hundreds of artists who were gainfully employed in the Republic during its “Golden Age.” Although during the 18th century only a few painters, such as Cor nelis Troost (1697–1750), could claim to have reached European stan dards, several painters won fame during the 19th century, including por trait painter Charles Hodges (1764–1837) and the romanticist landscape painters Wijnand Nuyen (1813–1839) and Andreas Schelfhout (1787– 1870). During the late 19th century, several painters were inspired by French Impressionism, and some of them founded the Hague School; among them was Jozef Israels (1824–1911), whose son Isaac (1865–1934) was a talented painter as well. Many Dutch artists fol lowed international trends and “isms,” for instance, Jan Tooropin sym bolism, Jacoba van Heemskerck in expressionism, and Johannes Moesman (1909–1988) and Carel Willink in surrealism. Other Dutch artists, such as Theo van Doesburg and Piet Mondrian, were trend setters themselves.

   See also COBRA; GOGH, Vincent van (1853–1890); MIERIS, Frans van (1635–1681).