Adam van Noort

Portrait of Adam van Noort by Anthony van Dyck

Adam van Noort (1561/62 – 1641) was a Flemish painter and draughtsman and one of the teachers of Peter Paul Rubens.

Life

Adam van Noort was born and died in Antwerp. He was the son of Lambert van Noort, who was originally from Amersfoort and had established himself in Antwerp in the 1550s where he was active primarily as a designer of stained-glass windows and engravings, an architect and, to a lesser extent, a painter. Adam van Noort probably initially trained with his father but must have had other teachers as his father died when he was still young.^[1] He became a master of the Guild of Saint Luke in 1587. He married Elisabeth Nuyts, with whom he had five children.

Van Noort served as dean of the Guild of Saint Luke from 1597 until 1602.^[2] He had problems with the Guild who accused him of poor management of the accounts and misappropriation of materials of the Guild.^[1]

Adam’s claim to fame largely rests on the fact that he was the teacher of two of the leading Flemish Baroque painters Peter Paul Rubens and Jacob Jordaens. Rubens only stayed for a little over a year and is not believed to have been influenced much by van Noort's training. Jordaens married van Noort’s daughter Elisabeth and would influence the style of his teacher and father-in-law.^[1] Other pupils of Adam van Noort include Ferdinand van Apshoven the Elder, Hendrick van Balen, Artus de Bruyn, Hendrik van der Eedt, Remoldus Eynhoudt, and Hendrick van Herp.^[2]

Work

The preaching of John the Baptist, 1601

Van Noort painted mainly paintings of religious subjects and portraits.^[2] He collaborated with Marten de Vos and Ambrosius Francken on the decorations for the Joyous Entry of Archduke Ernest of Austria in 1594. Originally working in the Mannerist style of the aforementioned two artists, he developed his own style which was a transformation of Frans Floris’ Romanism executed on a smaller scale (such as in the The preaching of John the Baptist, 1601).^[1] The Last Supper, a collaboration with Willem Key, is another good example of his style with its strong movement within a diagonal composition.^[3]

Later, with the arrival in his workshop and under the influence of Jacob Jordaens, he adopted some of the dynamism and monumentality of the Baroque into his work.^[1]

References

The Last Supper, with Willem Key

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Adam van Noort.

• 4 Paintings by Adam van Noort at the BBC Your Paintings site
• Adam van Noort on Artcyclopedia