Philips Angel II

Philips Angel II or Philips Angel van Leiden (c. 1618 in Leiden – after 11 July 1664 in Batavia, Dutch East Indies) was a Dutch Golden Age painter, etcher, writer and colonial administrator. Today he is remembered as the author of a 58-page booklet entitled 'Praise of the Art of Painting' which represents a rare resource for understanding Dutch art theory from the mid-17th century.

Biography Title page of Lof der Schilder-KonstPhilips Angel II's life and work are often mixed up with those of a relative (apparently a cousin), a contemporary painter of the same name (now referred to as Philips Angel I or Philips Angel van Middelburg), who was born in Middelburg in 1616.

Philips Angel II was active as a painter in Leiden from 1637 where he is listed as a master painter in 1638.

On 15 December 1643 he drew up a will in Leiden. He signed a document stating he was ceasing all activities as a painter (probably to relieve himself of the duty to pay dues to the guild) in 1645 and joined the Dutch East India Company. In the same year he sailed to Batavia in the Dutch East Indies. Here he would reside with interruptions from 1645 to 1664.

In the company of envoy Joan Cunaeus he traveled as a 'Chief Buyer' (in Dutch: opperkoopman) of the Dutch East India Company to Persia where he arrived in Bender-Abassi on 25 December 1651. He visited the ruins of Persepolis on 16 February 1652 and 11 days later took up his new post. With his interpreter Nils Mathson Köping he also traveled to Arabia. When soon thereafter he had to resign because of irregularities in his management, he travelled to Isfahan in Persia.

Work No extant paintings of Philips Angel II are known to exist. An etch of a man's head by him is dated 1637 and is reminiscent of Rembrandt.

Lof der Schilder-konst

His booklet 'Lof der Schilder-konst' ('Praise of the Art of Painting') situates itself in a line of art historical and theoretical writing in the Dutch Republic that started with the 'Schilder-boeck' published by Flemish émigré Karel van Mander in Haarlem in 1604. Angel gave his lecture at a time when he and other painters in Leiden were seeking permission to establish a guild to protect their economic interests. They likely also sought recognition as a group with an important socio-economic status in local society. The latter is reflected in the first part of the book which seeks to affirm the status of the painter's profession.

The first part of the booklet makes the traditional comparisons between the value and ranking of painting, sculpture and poetry. In this part Angel liberally borrows anecdotes on famous painters from antiquity up to the 17th century from van Mander's Schilder-boeck. According to Angel, painting deserves more praise than the other two arts because it can imitate all that is visible in nature.

The second part of the booklet deals with the wide range of skills that a painter must master to excel. This is the most original part of the booklet as Angel describes genres such as seascapes, battle scenes and guardroom scenes that were new at the time.