Pieter van Mol

Pieter Van Mol (1599, Antwerp – 8 April 1650, Paris) was a Flemish painter. His style was profoundly influenced by Rubens and Abraham Janssen.

Life

He began his career as an apprentice to Zeger van den Graeve in Antwerp from 1611 to 1622, where he became a master in the guild of St Luke in Antwerp. He set up a studio in Paris in 1631, where he received several commissions, such as the 1635 one for the frescoes in the chapelle du Sacré-Cœur in the église des Carmes, along with commissions from the queen.

In 1640, he married Anne Van der Burght (or Anna Van der Busch), with whom he had eight children, including the future painter and engraver Robert Mol. In 1648 he and other painters formed France's Académie royale de peinture et de sculpture under the patronage of Cardinal Mazarin – this later became the Académie des beaux-arts.

Works

in Canada :

• Descent from the Cross, Musée des beaux-arts, Montréal.

in France :

• Descent from the Cross, église Notre-Dame, Calais.
• Annunciation, Palais des beaux-arts, Lille.
• Christ taken down from the Cross, Musée du Louvre, Paris.
• Young man wearing a mitre, attributed to Van Mol, Musée du Louvre, Paris.
• Descent from the Cross", Musée des beaux-arts, Reims.

in Rumania :

• The expulsion of the guest, 1631, Brukenthal National Museum, Sibiu.

Bibliography

• (French) Le siècle de Rubens, exhibition catalogue, Bruxelles, Musées royaux des beaux-arts de Belgique, 1965, p. 138–139.
• (French) J. Gaston, Un Tableau de l'Abbaye de Saint-Germain-des-Prés (Conservé aujourd'hui au Musée de Marseille) : L' « Adoration des Bergers » (1643) de Pierre Van MOL, d'Anvers, Paris, Imprimerie L. de Soye, 1928, 8 p.