Adriaen Frans Boudewyns

Adriaen Frans Boudewijns (Brussels, 3 October 1644 – Brussels, 3 December 1719) was a Flemish landscape painter, draughtsman and etcher. He was known mainly for his landscapes with trees, Italianate landscapes with architecture, rivers and villages, city, coast and country views and architectural scenes.

Life Adriaen Frans Boudewijns was born in Brussels where he was baptized in the St Nicolas Church on 3 October 1644. He was the son of Nicolas Boudewijns and Françoise Jonquin. He married Louise de Ceul on 5 October 1664. The couple likely remained childless. On 23 November 1665 he was registered at the same time as a pupil and master of the Brussels Guild of Saint Luke. He was a pupil of the landscape painter and engraver Ignatius van der Stock.

On 16 December 1666 Boudewijns is recorded in Paris when he entered into a 3-year contract to work in the service of the Flemish painter Adam Frans van der Meulen. He is recorded as working with van der Meulen on the design of 12 Gobelins representing the months for French King Louis XIV. Van der Meulen executed the smaller figures and part of the landscapes. The remainder of the landscapes was completed by Boudewijns and Abraham Genoels, another Flemish painter active in Paris.

Boudewijns also travelled with Genoels to make sketches of a castle near Brussels for a design of a tapestry for the King of France. While in Paris, Boudewijns engraved many of van der Meulen's compositions.

Boudewijns married the sister of Adam Frans van der Meulen called Barbe or Barbara on 12 January 1670. The couple had two children of whom the oldest named Frans became a painter. Barbe Boudewijns died on 2 March 1674.

He often collaborated with other specialist painters who added the figures in his landscapes. Collaborations with Charles Emmanuel Biset, Pointié Dupont, his pupil Matthys Schoevaerdts and most frequently Pieter Bout are recorded. These Classical idealized landscapes became Boudewijns' trademark. His meticulous rendering of trees shows the influence of Gaspard Dughet. All his landscapes are meticulously painted and often peopled with figures painted by Pieter Bout.

The landscapes of Boudewijns can generally be divided into three types. The first type resembles the work of the Sonian Forest school of landscape painters such as Jacques d'Arthois and Cornelis Huysmans. These painters from Brussels had a preference for depicting sand flats with deep lying roads surrounded by trees. These compositions show the landscapes in a bright light. A second type of landscape depicts Italianate architectural elements set in a flat landscape with a row of hills as a backdrop. Finally, he made a number of village and river landscapes that recall the style of Jan Brueghel the Elder in compositional structure and technical precision.

Prints Boudewijns' many prints were based on paintings or designs of Adam Frans van der Meulen, Abraham Genoels and on his own designs.