Jean-Baptiste Descamps

Jean-Baptiste Descamps (; 28 August 1714, Dunkerque – 30 June 1791, Rouen) was a French writer on art and artists, and painter of village scenes. He later founded an academy of art and his son later became a museum curator.

Biography Descamps was born in Dunkerque, and trained by his father to become a Jesuit. He preferred to study art and became a pupil of Pierre Dulin, Nicolas Lancret and Nicolas de Largillierre at the Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture in Paris.

Accompanying Charles-André van Loo on a trip to England in 1740–1741 after his training, The school followed the basic ideas of the Philosophes of the Enlightenment. This school was to play a key role in the development of pictorial art in Normandy, and Descamps would direct this academy until he died.

Besides his son , his pupils were Charles Eschard, , , Etienne de Lavallée-Poussin, , Noël Le Mire, Jean-Jacques Le Veau, Anicet Charles Gabriel Lemonnier, and Jean-Jacques Lequeu.

Works Allegory of the discovery of AmericaPainting attributed to Jean-Baptiste Descamps. Descamps painted popular genre subjects in the manner of Jean-Baptiste Greuze. 1760: La Vie des Peintres Flamands, Allemands et Hollandois, avec des portraits gravés en Taille-douce, une indication de leurs principaux Ouvrages, & des réflexions sur leurs différentes manieres, Par M J.B. Descamps, Peintre, Membre l'Académie Impériale Franciscienne, de celle des Sciences, Belle-Lettres, & Art de Rouen, & Professeur de l'Ecole du Dessein de la méme Ville, Tome Troisieme, A Paris, chez Desaint & Saillant, rue de S. Jean de Beauvais, Pissot, Quai de Conty, Durand, rue de Foin, M D C LX, Avec Approbation et Privilege du Roi 1764: La Vie des Peintres Flamands, Allemands et Hollandois, avec des portraits gravés en Taille-douce, une indication de leurs principaux Ouvrages, & des réflexions sur leurs différentes manieres, Par M J.B. Descamps, Peintre, Membre l'Académie Impériale Franciscienne, de celle des Sciences, Belle-Lettres, & Art de Rouen, & Professeur de l'Ecole du Dessein de la méme Ville, Tome Quatrieme, A Paris, chez Desaint & Saillant, rue de S. Jean de Beauvais, Pissot, Quai de Conty, Durand, le Neveu, rue S. Jacques, au coin de la rue du Platre, M D CC LXIV, Avec Approbation et Privilege du Roi

Churches of Flanders and Brabant In 1769 he wrote the book Voyage pittoresque de la Flandre et du Brabant, which describes the towns and principal churches of Flanders and Brabant with their artworks.

Through these works he renewed the interest in the Old Flemish masters, especially Hans Memling and Jan van Eyck. They also had the adverse effect of being used by the French Revolutionary Army, after their invasion of Flanders in 1790, to requisition the best paintings for transport to the Musée Central des Arts in the Louvre, Paris.