Simon Du Bois

Simon Du Bois or Dubois (baptized 26 July 1632, Antwerp – buried 26 May 1706, London) ), was a portrait painter, of Flemish or Dutch origin, active in England from 1685 until his death.

Life Du Bois was the youngest son of Hendrick Du Bois, and his wife Helena Leonora Sieveri. Born at Antwerp, the family lived in Rotterdam by 1643, where Hendrick was described as a painter and dealer in works of art and where he died in 1647.

From 1646 to 1653 Dubois lived in Haarlem, where he was a pupil of Van Berchem and Wouwermans, and took to painting horses and cattle pictures. In 1653 he traveled with his 13-year older brother Eduard (1619-1696). Here Simon began his career as a painter of small battle-pieces in the Italian fashion. In 1657 he was active in Venice, in 1661 he was back in Rotterdam, but in 1667 he was paid for a portrait he painted in Rome of Alexander VII. He was a "history and landskip painter", according to Vertue, born at Antwerp, and "disciple to one Groenwegen, a landskip painter likewise". He travelled with his brother from Haarlem to Italy, and remained there for 27 years. He also worked some time in Paris, and on his way to Italy executed some works for Charles Emmanuel, duke of Savoy.

In 1680, he came to London, presumably with his brother, and lived with Simon in Covent Garden, where he died at the age of 76. His name appears as publisher on Visscher's prints of the portraits of his parents mentioned above.