Jan de Bray

Jan de Bray ( – April 4, 1697) was a Dutch Golden Age painter. He lived and worked in Haarlem until the age of 60, when he went bankrupt and moved to Amsterdam. In his family portrait depicting the banquet of Antony and Cleopatra at the moment when Cleopatra puts her earring in the wine, Jan is depicted standing on the left. In the earlier version, the sons look up to the father, and in this version, the brothers (all since deceased except for Dirck) look at Jan.

Jan de Bray was influenced by his father Salomon de Bray, and the portraitists Bartholomeus van der Helst, and Frans Hals. De Bray's works are mainly portraits, often of groups, and history paintings. He specialised in combining the two genres in the portrait historié, portraits of historical figures using contemporary figures, including himself and his family. Among his finest works are two versions of the Banquet of Cleopatra, using his own family, including himself, as models (Royal Collection, 1652, and Currier Museum of Art, New Hampshire, 1669). The second version has great pathos, as most of those depicted had died in the plague of 1663–4.

Biography Jan de Bray was born in Haarlem. According to Houbraken he was the most famous pupil of his father, the painter, architect and poet Salomon de Bray. Houbraken called Jan the "pearl in Haarlem's crown". His brother Dirck de Bray was a flower painter who later became a monk in the monastery at Gaesdonck near Goch. Margaretha de Meyer whom he married in 1672, and Victoria Stalpert van der Wielen whom he married 30 January 1678 – each died before him; Victoria shortly after giving birth to their son, Johan Lucas. In 1689 he was declared bankrupt as a Haarlem citizen and moved to Amsterdam, where he died, though he was buried in Haarlem.