Jan van Scorel (1495-1562)Jan van Scorel was born in 1495 in the village of Schoorl, near Alkmaar. After attending Alkmaar's Latin schoolLatin SchoolThis was what the schools of the early Middle Ages founded by bishops or monasteries (and later on by municipalities) were called. In these schools the humanities or liberal arts were taught: grammar, rhetoric, oratory, arithmetic, geometry, astronomy and music. Some of these schools focused on basic reading and writing skills; others offered a kind of secondary education. In the 19th century the Latin School was increasingly replaced by the Gymnasium that also taught Greek; modern languages and the sciences were also taught - subjects that had virtually no place in the curriculum of the Latin School. as a child, he was apprenticed to the Haarlem painter Cornelis Willemsz. In 1512 he left for Amsterdam. There he became an assistant in the studio of the artist Jacob Cornelisz. van Oostsanen. Jan van Scorel was one of the first Northern Netherlandish painters to visit Italy. In 1522 in Rome he entered the service of the Dutch Pope Adrian VI: he was appointed curator of antiquities at the Vatican. After returning to the Netherlands he entered the Church in Utrecht. Thanks to his stay in Italy and his acquaintance with the work of Michelangelo and Raphael he played a crucial role in the introduction of the Renaissance to the Netherlands. |
