Hendrick Avercamp

1585 - 1634 Dutch

Hendrick Avercamp

Pioneer of Dutch winter landscapes

Hendrick Avercamp was a Dutch painter. Avercamp was born in Amsterdam, where he studied with the Danish-born portrait painter Pieter Isaacks (1569–1625), and perhaps also with David Vinckboons. In 1608 he moved from Amsterdam to Kampen in the province of Overijssel. Avercamp was deaf and mute and was known as "de Stomme van Kampen" (the mute of Kampen). As one of the first landscape painters of the 17th-century Dutch school, he specialized in painting the Netherlands in winter. Avercamp's paintings are colorful and lively, with carefully crafted images of the people in the landscape. His works give a vivid depiction of sport and leisure in the Netherlands in the beginning of the 17th century. Many of Avercamp's paintings feature people ice skating on frozen lakes. Avercamp's work enjoyed great popularity and he sold his drawings, many of which were tinted with water-color, as finished pictures to be pasted into the albums of collectors. The Royal Collection has an outstanding collection of his works. Avercamp died in Kampen and was interred there in the Sint Nicolaaskerk.

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