Beach scene

Hendrick van Anthonissen (29 May 1605 – 12 Nov 1656) Son of Aert Anthonisz. Born in Amsterdam where he will have been taught at first by his father. He is next traceable in 1626, still in Amsterdam in 1626 as the servant i.e. pupil of Jan Porcellis whose influence determined his style (Bredius, Künstler-Inventare, p. 615, as Hendrick Aertsz). When Porcellis moved on to Leyden, his pupil apparently set up for himself in Amsterdam; when in December 1630 the bans were read for his marriage to Judith Flessiers, sister of Jan Porcellis’ wife Janneke, still recorded as residing at Amsterdam (Bredius, p. 629). Shortly after the death of Jan Porcellis in early 1632 Hendrick and Judith moved to Leyden (later to Leyderdorp). In c. 1639 they moved back to Amsterdam for good, taking along Janneke Porcellis, who died there in late 1641. It is true that in 1651 Hendrick is recorded as living in Rijnsburg near Leyden again (Bredius, p. 632) and that his presence is attested by documentary evidence in Rotterdam and by pictorial evidence on the Zeeland streams. But this born marine painter apparently had the urge to be afloat from time to time and there is ample evidence suggesting that from then on he kept his main residence at Amsterdam, where his death occurred and from where his widow Judith moved back to Leyden soon. Hendrick van Anthonissen signed his works mostly in capital letters, HVA plus as many following letters as he could squeeze in. But this we don’t really know for his early years when he called himself first Hendrick Aertsz and then Hendrick Anthonisz (lastly in 1632). The “van” appears in documents from 1633 onwards; early works may well be marked HA, without the V. Seascapes: St.Petersburg 1647; Amsterdam; Antwerp; Greenwich; Oldenburg; Orléans; Oslo; Warsaw. Dates are very rare. The Petersburg date is corroborated by a clear 1646 date on a larger similar work in sale Cologne, Lempertz 17 May 1962. An earliest date has been read as 1633 on a smaller panel with art-dealers Silvano Lodi (ill. Müllenmeister 1973). Seabattles: Amsterdam, Nederlands Scheepvaart Museum 1639; Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum 1653; Stockholm. Beachscapes: Antwerp, Smidt van Gelder; Schwerin. (ed. M. de Kinkelder, May 2014)). This painting is signed H.v.Anthonissen and dated 1637,



In 2014 one of Anthonissen’s paintings View of Scheveningen Sands, which was painted in 1641, underwent conservation at the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge. Restoration work uncovered a beached whale in the picture which had been obscured before 1873, when it was donated to the museum.