Hendrik Cornelisz Vroom
The Return to Amsterdam of the Second Expedition to the East Indies, 1599
Oil on panel
height 102.3 cm width 218.4 cm
Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam
The painting shows the return to Amsterdam of the ships ‘Overijssel’, ‘Vriesland’, ‘Mauritius’ and ‘Hollandia’ from the second Dutch trading expedition to the East Indies in 1599. The city of Amsterdam is visible on the right. The returned ships are grouped in the middle distance with numerous smaller vessels surrounding them. 'Hollandia' is shown at the centre of the group. The painting is detailed in its varied observations of human behaviour. Figures are shown in the foreground boat, on the left, whilst a man can be seen standing on his head in the small craft in the centre. The work is careful in its depiction of rigging, people on deck and other details. Men are shown climbing in the rigging of the ship on the far right. More on this painting
The Dutch first reached the Indonesian archipelago in 1596. But above all it was the second attempt, in 1598, that was a commercial triumph. As stated in the inscription on the frame, ‘trade was planted there’ at that time. The first step towards the success of the future VOC had been taken. It was a truly joyous occasion when the fully laden ships dropped anchor again in Amsterdam’s harbour in 1599. More on this painting
Hendrik Cornelisz Vroom (c.1562 – February 4, 1640
(buried)) was a Dutch Golden Age painter credited with being the
founder of Dutch marine art. Beginning with the "birds-eye" viewpoint
of earlier Netherlandish marine art, his later works show a view from lower
down, and more realistic depiction of the seas themselves.
Vroom was
born in Haarlem. Much of what is known of his life comes from his biography by
Karel van Mander. Vroom was born into a family of artists and began his career
as a pottery painter and when his mother remarried, he boarded a ship for Spain
and from thence via Livorno and Florence to Rome.
In
Florence he was patronized by Cardinal Ferdinando de' Medici, later Grand Duke
of Tuscany. While there he became a pupil of Paulus Bril. He went back and
forth to Venice, where he earned money as a majolica painter.
When he
returned north, he travelled via Milan, Genoa, Albisola. From there he
travelled to Paris, and from there he went to Rouen, where he became mortally
ill but was saved by a woman who bandaged his head. There he boarded a ship
homewards and was back in Haarlem in 1590.
During his
next journey, this time to Portugal, he survived shipwreck, but was threatened
with execution as "an English pirate" - from which he was saved by
being recognized as a Catholic from his salvaged devotional paintings, which
convinced the monks on the beach that he and his companions were not
"heathen Protestants"
Haarlem Vroom died in Haarlem, in his late seventies. More on Hendrik
Cornelisz Vroom
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