Albertus Brondgeest

Albertus Brondgeest (Amsterdam, 2 October 1786 – Amsterdam, 30 July 1849) was a Dutch art trader, drawer and painter, primarily known for his landscapes. He was a pupil of Pieter Gerardus van Os, but also studied with Wouter Johannes van Troostwijk.

Life

Brondgeest collected and studied art from the 17th century and got his inspiration from those works. His paintings were not his primary source of income, but he was a trader and came from a reasonably wealthy family, which was at first not very pleased with the artistic ambitions of young Albertus. In 1817 he opened his own art trade, which he made good business with. He shared his business at least for a while with Ferdinand Bol.

In 1828, he married Anna Barbara Ratelband and had three sons and three daughters with her.

Work

At a young age, interested in drawing, Brondgeest received guidance of Van Os (a cattle and landscape painter who recently moved to Amsterdam), who later became his friend. After a few years of his education, he studied the landscapes of Jan Hulswit, which further inspired him. While early works by Brondgeest have been produced with water-based paint, he switched in 1809 on the advice of his friend and tutor Van Troostwijk to oil-based paint, with success. Thanks to his collections and his art trade, he had a relatively unrestricted access to art from that period, and could study this extensively, which he happily did. In 1814 Brondgeest won a golden medal by the Society Felix Meritis in Amsterdam with his painting Een gezigt binnen eene Nederlandsche stad, bij zonnedaglicht, met behoorlijke stoffaadje (A view within a Dutch city, at sunlight, with a significant "stoffaadje"). In 1839 he was recognized by the city government of The Hague with a silver medal for his submission to an exhibition there. He was a member of the Amsterdam drawing society Zonder Wet of Spreuk (without law or motto). He was a member of the Fourth Class of the Koninklijk Nederlandsch Instituut (Royal Dutch Institute) from 1816 onwards and of the Koninklijke Academie voor Beeldende Kunsten Amsterdam (Royal Academy of Visual Arts Amsterdam) and the Koninklijke Academie te Antwerpen (Royal Academy of Antwerp).