Hendrik Herregouts

Hendrik Herregouts (1633 in Mechelen – 1704 in Antwerp) was a Flemish history and portrait painter and draughtsman with an international career spanning Italy, Germany and his native Flanders.

Life

Hendrik Herregouts was born in Mechelen as the son of painter David Herregouts from Mechelen who moved to Roermond in 1646. Here David Herregouts built a successful career as a painter thanks to the support of the local Catholic Church. Hendrik's mother was Cecile Geniets, a daughter from a family of butchers in Mechelen. Hendrik had three brothers who became painters: Jan Baptist Herregouts (Roermond, c. 1646 – Bruges, 1721) was a Flemish portrait and history painter, etcher and brewer mainly active in Bruges. Willem Herregouts who emigrated to Amiens in France where he was known inter alia as Guillaume Herregosse or Guillaume Hergosse. Maximilian Herregouts about whom currently nothing much is known other than two works, one entitled Kitchen, in which a woman is busy baking pancakes (1674) and a second entitled Eliezer and Rebecca at the well.

Hendrik Herregouts likely first trained under his father who had moved to Roermond. Hendrik Herregouts travelled to Rome at an early age to continue his studies. He later moved to Germany. He married Anna Dorothea Cremers in Cologne in 1660 or 1661. In 1664 Hendrik Herregouts became a master of the Guild of Saint Luke in Antwerp, but some years later we find him completing commissions in Mechelen. Here he had to join the local Guild of Saint Luke. Around 1679–1680, he had again a workshop in Antwerp.

He died at an elevated age in Antwerp. A Martyrdom of Saint Matthew, originally painted for the Antwerp Cathedral is now in the St. Paul's Church, Antwerp. A Divine Friend of Children dated 1680 in the Göttweig Abbey near Krems in Lower Austria shows his mastery of colour and composition. He also often collaborated with other painters. He painted the staffage in the landscapes of Jan Asselijn. In his later years, he collaborated with still life painters Gaspar Peeter Verbruggen the Younger, Simon Hardimé and Jan Baptist Bosschaert who painted flowers around putti and nymphs painted by Herregouts.

Herregouts has sometimes been confused with an obscure genre painter by the name H. or Hendrick Herdebout; There is not always unanimity over the attribution of certain works to Hendrik or his brother Jan Baptist as their styles were similar.