Pieter Boel

Pieter Boel in Het Gulden Cabinet

Pieter Boel or Peeter Boel (* 1626 , † 1674 ) was a Flemish painter of the Baroque period who specialized in lavishly staged still lifes and animal portraits.

Life

He comes from a family of artists from Antwerp. His father Jan Boel was an engraver , his brother was also an engraver. Quirin Boel the 2nd Boel's teacher was Jan Fijt , who was known for skillfully painted landscapes and animal portraits. Boel was registered in the guild of St. Luke as a winemaker (a title that was also passed on to the children of the members of the guild) around 1650. He probably made a trip to Italy in the 1640s, where he also went to Genoa and Rome came. In Genoa he stayed with his uncle, the painter and art dealer Cornelis de Wael , who helped Boel to gain a foothold in Italy.

After 1668 he traveled to Paris . There he worked in the workshop of Charles Le Bruns on his first mural. In 1674 he was appointed court painter to King Louis XIV , but died in September of the same year.

Boel was the father of Jan Baptist II and Balthasar-Lucas Boel. He taught his sons and also David de Koninck .

Work

He painted still lifes (especially floral motifs, still lifes hunting, animal and fish still lifes , vanitas paintings and still lifes with weapons, as well as landscapes.) Most of his works are undated, so it is difficult to establish a chronology of their creation. However, he followed the style of his teacher Jan Fijt throughout his life.

It is also said of Pieter Boel that he revolutionized animal painting because he was not satisfied with stuffed animals like other artists, but went to the menagerie of Versailles Palace to study animals in natural poses. For an epoch, his naturalism inspired other artists who had dedicated themselves to depicting animals, such as the painter Jean-Baptiste Oudry or the sculptor Antoine-Louis Barye .

His animal studies were also used in the foreground of a large tapestry at Versailles known as the Months or The Royalty . The French painter François Desportes copied parts of Boel's drawings and had them woven into the tapestry, which was not known until the 20th century. The discovery of the templates led to a new perspective on Boel's impact as an animal painter in his time.