Meindert hobbema biography examples
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Meindert HOBBEMA
Amsterdam, baptised 31 October 1638–Amsterdam, 7 December 1709
Dutch landscape painter and draughtsman
Despite focusing on a narrow genre – the wooded landscape – Meindert Hobbema has achieved lasting fame. The son of Lubbert Meyndertsz (son of Meyndert), a carpenter, he seems to have taken the surname ‘Hobbema’ from an early age; it is unclear why. At the age of fifteen he, with his brother and sister, entered the Amsterdam orphanage. He left it in 1655 and joined the studio of Jacob van Ruisdael (1628/9–82), who was then living in Amsterdam, and remained with him for several years. Their styles are very close, especially in drawings; there are no signed Hobbema drawings, so there is still much confusion.1 Hobbema’s few surviving pictures from this period, however, reflect knowledge of the work of Cornelis Hendricksz. Vroom (1590/92–1661) and Salomon van Ruysdael (c. 1600/1603–70). Not until 1662 do his works show any influence of his master; but th
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Meindert Hobbema was thought to have been born in 1638 in Amsterdam but there are varied opinions on this fact. The name “Hobbema” was his own invention as his father’s name was Lubbert Meyndert. He was the great landscape painter of the Dutch Golden Age. The Dutch Golden age was that period in Dutch history which spanned the 17th century, at the time of, and following the Eighty Years War, which encompassed the struggle for Dutch independence. The newly formed Dutch Republic became the most prosperous nation in Europe, and led European trade, science, and art. The northern Netherlandish provinces that formed part of the new state had customarily been less significant as artistic centres in comparison with the Flemish cities in the south. The war caused tremendous disruption and resulted in the break with the old monarchist and Catholic cultural traditions. As a result, Dutch art needed to reinvent itself entirely, a task in which it was very largely successful and this re-b
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The Alley at Middelharnis
Meindert Hobbema1669
Oil on canvas, 103.5 x 141 cm.
The National galleri, London
Meyndert HOBBEMA
Amsteddam 1638–Amsterdam 1709
Meyndert Hobbema was born in 1638 in Amsterdam. He adopted the name Hobbema as a ung man, though it does not appear to have been used by his father. He was a pupil of Jacob van Ruisdael, who testified in 1660 that Hobbema served and learned with the for a few years. Though he learned from the example of other landscape artists, Hobbema was very close to his master for several years, even on one occasion basing a painting on an etching by Ruisdael. By the time he was twenty-five, Hobbema was at the height of his powers and the rival of his mästare. Though he never achieved the range or profundity of Ruisdael, he was a much more fluent painter and his sparkling, tightly wrought, and well-wooded landscapes, though repetitious, are approaching perfection. Then, in 1668, his thirtieth year, he married the kitchen-mai