Johannes Voorhout

Johannes Voorhout (11 November 1647 – 25 August 1717) was a Dutch painter of history paintings, portraits and genre scenes. After training in the Dutch Republic he worked for a number of years in Hamburg before returning to work in Amsterdam.

Life

Voorhout was born in Uithoorn, North Holland, as the son of the Amsterdam clock maker Cornelis Voorhout. Seeing that his son was better suited to drawing than the technical aspects of watch making, he apprenticed him to Constantijn Verhout in Gouda. Verhout was a painter of modern history scenes. After six years, Voorhout returned to Amsterdam in 1664. Here he worked for the next five years in the workshop of Jan van Noordt, a prominent history and portrait painter. He married in 1670 Margaretha Vos. The couple had two children: circa 1676 Johannes II was born in Hamburg. The son studied painting under his father and was also a musician. About ten years later a daughter (Cornelia).

In 1672, worried about the impending invasion by the French, he fled the country with his family and settled in Friedrichstadt, which had a large Dutch population and where his wife had friends. He worked for the court in Gottorf, probably painting decorative works. He taught his son Johannes II, and Ernst Stuven, but never had the success that he had enjoyed in Hamburg. and was later used in the 1930s as a model for the Dutch 500 guilder note.

He painted group portraits such as the Elegant company making music (1674, History of Hamburg Museum). Voorhout may have included in this painting a self-portrait as the man in the feathered hat. A dedication "to brothers Buxtehude and Joh: Adam Reink" is now thought to identify the gamba player Buxtehude and the keyboard player Johann Adam Reinken. The identification of the boy holding a canon as Johann Theile has been thrown into doubt by the recent discovery of a portrait of Theile in Lübeck.

Museums with Voorhout's works

Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, Netherlands Amsterdams Historisch Museum, Amsterdam, Netherlands The State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia Bowes Museum, Barnard Castle, Teesdale, County Durham, England Hatchlands Park, East Clandon, Surrey, England Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam, Netherlands Centraal Museum, Utrecht, Netherlands Groninger Museum, Groningen, Netherlands King John III Palace Museum, Wilanów, Warsaw, Poland Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest, Budapest, Hungary Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, Sweden Museum für Hamburgische Geschichte, Hamburg, Germany Worcester Art Museum, Worcester, Massachusetts