Miereveld or Mierevelt, Dutch portrait painter, active mainly in his native Delft. In 1625 in The Hague he became Painter of the Princes of Orange. His portraits are mostly small in size, often busts only. They are dull and repetitive, but meticulously crafted and of great value as historical records.
He was highly successful and enormously prolific. It is reported that Miereveld himself estimated that he made about 10.000 portraits.
This painting is one of the earliest of its kind in Dutch art. In composition these works could be considered the unsavoury counter-parts of civic-guard company portraits, which often depicts the officers around a table laden with food.
The painting was commissioned by the surgeon’s guild in Delft from the leading painter of the city, Michiel van Miereveld. It is specified in the Latin inscription on the railing that the painter’s elder son, Pieter, actually carried out the painting following his father’s design. No independent pictures by Pieter is known, and he died six years after working on the painting, at the age of twenty-seven.
Sir Horace Vere, 1st Baron Vere of Tilbury (1565-1635) (also Horatio Vere or Horatio de Vere) was an English military leader during the Eighty Years’ War and the Thirty Years’ War. This portrait, with its remarkable inset battle scene, was painted during Vere’s time in the Low Countries. It incorporates his motto ‘VERO NIHIL VERIUS’: ‘nothing is more true than the truth’.
The sitters of this painting and its pendant were identified as Jacob van Dael (or Dalen; 1570-1644), and his second wife, Margaretha van Clootwijk (c. 1580-1662). Jacob van Dalen was professionally known by the Latinized form of his name, Vallensis. He was born in Speyer, Germany, studied medicine in Leiden, and became the personal physician of the Stadholder in The Hague. He appears in a group portrait painted twenty-three years earlier, the Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Willem van der Meer.
Both husband and wife are buried in the Oude Kerk in Delft, and the gravestone of the couple bears the same crests as the paintings in the Metropolitan Museum.
The sitters of this painting and its pendant were identified as Jacob van Dael (or Dalen; 1570-1644), and his second wife, Margaretha van Clootwijk (c. 1580-1662). Jacob van Dalen was professionally known by the Latinized form of his name, Vallensis. He was born in Speyer, Germany, studied medicine in Leiden, and became the personal physician of the Stadholder in The Hague. He appears in a group portrait painted twenty-three years earlier, the Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Willem van der Meer.
Both husband and wife are buried in the Oude Kerk in Delft, and the gravestone of the couple bears the same crests as the paintings in the Metropolitan Museum.
This portrait was painted for the city council of Delft as the companion piece to Van Miereveld’s portrait of Prince Maurice, commissioned three years earlier.
Frederick Hendrick (1584-1647) was Prince of Orange and Stadtholder of Holland from 1625 to 1647. He was the youngest child of William the Silent, born at Delft about six months before his father’s assassination (July 10, 1584).
Frederick Henry (1584-1647) was the youngest son of Prince William of Orange, founding father of the House of Orange-Nassau. He became stadholder of Holland and Zeeland in 1625, and was given command of the Dutch republic’s armed and naval forces. Despite the republican form of government of the Netherlands, Frederick Henry, together with his consort Amalia of Solms, maintained a surprisingly regal status.
Countless portraits of Prince Frederick Henry were made during his life, no less than thirty-six from the workshop of the Delft portraitist Michiel van Miereveld.
Frederik Hendrik (1584-1647), was the sovereign Prince of Orange and stadtholder of Holland, Zeeland, Utrecht, Guelders, and Overijssel from 1625 to 1647. He was an important patron of the arts.
The painting is signed bottom left: M.Miereveld.
Lubbert Gerritsz. (1535-1612) was a Mennonite theologian in Amsterdam and in Hoorn. The identification is confirmed by a comparison with Miereveldt’s portrait of Gerritsz. in Amsterdam University, also dating from 1607.
In 1607 the Delft city fathers commissioned the Delft portraitist Michiel van Miereveld to paint a portrait of the Dutch stadholder Prince Maurits (1567-1625). Van Miereveld went to The Hague to record his subjects’s features and produced this portrait of the prince in armour, with sword and baton, representing his role as captain general of the Dutch army. This picture became the model for all the later portraits of the prince. (A full-length version of this portrait from 1615-20 is now in the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam.) The portrait was engraved by Jan Muller in 1608and, like countless copies from Van Mireveld’s workshop, hung in homes throughout the Netherlands. A bust-length version of the 1607 composition hangs above the fireplace in A Man Weighing Gold by Cornelis de Man.
The unidentified sitter is represented half-length. The painting is signed and dated middle left: Ae 1631 / M. Miervelt.
There is a companion-piece depicting a woman, also in The Hermitage.
Although this is a characteristic work by the painter, only the face of the sitter is by Van Miereveld, the other parts of the painting were executed by another hand.
Hundreds of conservative portraits dating from the first half of the seventeenth century follow the patterns employed by Van Miereveld and the artists he influenced, such as Jan van Ravesteyn in The Hague and Paulus Morelsee in Utrecht. Van Miereveld’s reputation rested not upon invention or painterly effects but upon fidelity to appearance and exceptional craftsmanship.
The identity of the sitter is not known. The painting is signed and dated right centre: A° 1630. / M. Mierevelt.
In the first decades of the 17th century we find centres of portraiture at Delft and The Hague where at various times the stadhouder had his court, the States-General its seat, and most foreign diplomats resided. Michiel Jansz. van Miereveld and his pupil Jan Anthonisz van Ravensteyn (c. 1572-1657) are the outstanding names. Both artists inspired a host of minor painters. Their portraits are restrained, rather dry visual reports, competent in draughtsmanship and with only a moderate decorative effect. Costumes, armour, and faces are rendered with the same meticulous care and reliability. Miereveld was, it seems, prepared to make some adjustments in the features of a countenance to satisfy a foreign client. Miereveld enjoyed a greater reputation - particularly among court circles in The Hague - and he kept a workshop busy making portraits of members of the house of Orange-Nassau and other noble families.
Maurits is represented in the gilded suit of armour the States-General had given him for his military victory at Nieuwpoort in 1600. The portrait thus makes claims for the Stadhouder’s indispensability to the States-General and the Republic. Van Miereveld’s studio produced numerous paintings of the prince.
