Panoramic View of Antwerp from the East

Jan Wildens, 1636

Gezicht op de stad Antwerpen en de omliggende landerijen, gezien vanaf de landzijde (vanuit het oosten). Over de wegen naar de stad gaan reizigers, reiswagens en andere rijtuigen, wandelaars en een herder met een kudde schapen. Op het land zijn boeren bezig met zaaien, oogsten en graven. In de verte het profiel van de stad met de bolwerken.

  • Artwork typepainting
  • Object numberSK-A-616
  • Dimensionstotal: weight 75 kg, outer size: depth 10 cm (support incl. frame), support: height 197.5 cm x width 367 cm
  • Physical characteristicsoil on canvas

Discover more

more by Jan Wildens

Gezicht op Kasteel Crayenhof te Zwijndrecht, 1606

Peter Paul Rubens

Gezicht op Kasteel Crayenhof te Zwijndrecht, 1606

Konijnen- en eendenjacht

Jacques Stella

Konijnen- en eendenjacht

Landschap met valkeniers en veehoeder

Jan Wildens (possibly)

Landschap met valkeniers en veehoeder

Jan Wildens

Panoramic View of Antwerp from the East

1636

Inscriptions

  • signature and date, bottom right:I. WILDENS [D and E damaged]. FECIT. 1636 [3 damaged]

Conservation

  • W.A. Hopman, 1886: treated
  • E. Tromp, 1993: cleaned and restored

Provenance

…; anonymous sale [Jonkheer Hendrik Six van Hillegom (1790-1847), Lord of Hillegom], Amsterdam (J. de Vries et al.), 25 November 1852, no. 8, as Fluweele Bruegel (‘Eene kapitale Schilderij, voorstellende een gezigt op de stad Antwerpen en het omliggende land, genomen uit de hoogte en rijk gestoffeerd met beelden en paarden. hoog 2 el, breed 3 el 50 d. Doek’), bought in at fl. 25; donated by Jonkheer Jan Pieter Six, Lord of Hillegom (1824-99) to the museum, 1852, as Bruegel;1NHA, ARS, Kop, inv. 38, pp. 99-100 (20 February 1852); NHA, ARS, IS, inv. 24, no. 89 (3 March 1852); NHA, ARS, Kop, inv. 38, p. 105 (7 May 1852). Jan Six, email 18 February 2015, kindly states that the picture is not listed in earlier Six inventories (nor was it part of the Van Winter collection, for which see R. Priem, ‘The ‘Most Excellent Collection’ of Lucretia Johanna van Winter: The Years 1809-22, with a Catalogue of the Works Purchased’, Simiolus 25 (1997) pp. 103-235, esp. pp. 103ff.). on loan through the DRVK, since 1951; on loan to the Middelburg Town Hall, since 1951

Object number: SK-A-616

Credit line: Gift of Jonkheer Six van Hillegom, Amsterdam

The artist

Biography

Jan Wildens (Antwerp 1583/84 - Antwerp 1653)

The artist and dealer, Jan Wildens, chiefly known for his landscapes, was born in Antwerp in 1583 or 1584,2For example A. van der Willigen and F.G. Meijer, A Dictionary of Dutch and Flemish Still-Life Painters Working in Oils, 1525-1725, Leiden 2003, p. 213; W. Adler, Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Rubens, Fridingen 1980, p. 12 gives the date as 1585/1586; the RKD proposes 1584/86. the son of Hendrik Wildens and Magdalena Vosbergen. His mother early widowed remarried Cornelis Cock. Jan was a pupil of Peeter Verhulst from 1596 and became a master eight years later.3P. Rombouts and T. van Lerius, De Liggeren en andere historische archieven der Antwerpsche Sint Lucasgilde, ondere zinspreuk: ‘Wt Ionsten Versaemt’, 2 vols., Antwerp/The Hague 1864-76, I, pp. 394, 425. Although he took on a pupil in 1610,4P. Rombouts and T. van Lerius, De Liggeren en andere historische archieven der Antwerpsche Sint Lucasgilde, ondere zinspreuk: ‘Wt Ionsten Versaemt’, 2 vols., Antwerp/The Hague 1864-76, I, p. 466. nothing certain is known of his early work, but he was already the possessor of funds sufficient to make bequests to his siblings and half siblings in the will he made in 1613 prior to his departure to Italy.5F.J. van den Branden, Geschiedenis der Antwerpsche schilderschool, 3 vols., Antwerp 1883, II, p. 202. His earliest, extant dated painting is of 1614, one of a series of the months of the year, long recorded in a Genoese collection in which city it was most likely executed.6S.J. Barnes et al., Van Dyck a Genova: Grande pittura e collezionismo, exh. cat. Genoa (Palazzo Ducale) 1997, no. 91a. He may have returned to Antwerp by 1616.7The Jesuit and art adviser George Gage (? 1528-1638) in a letter to Sir Dudley Carleton (1573-1632) of 14 March 1617 may have been referring to him when he wrote of ‘the rarest man living in Landscape’ lately in Italy and in Antwerp by the previous year, see C. Ruelens and M. Rooses (eds.), Correspondance de Rubens et documents epistolaires concernant sa vie et ses oeuvres, 6 vols., Antwerp 1887-1909, II, p. 104. At all events he married Maria Stappaert there three years later; the wedding contract is significant for the references to his wealth and dealership and also to Peter Paul Rubens (1577-1640), one of the witnesses, as ‘his good friend’;8F.J. van den Branden, Geschiedenis der Antwerpsche schilderschool, 3 vols., Antwerp 1883, II, p. 202. Rubens is known to have painted his portrait and one of his mother.9Nos. 506 and 190 of the Wildens estate inventory, E. Duverger, Fontes historiae Artis Neerlandicae Bronnen voor de Kunstgeschiedenis van de Nederlanden: Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Antwerpse kunstinventarissen uit de zeventiende eeuw, 13 vols., Brussels 1984-2004, VI, pp. 491 and 484. The Stappaerts were likely members of the wealthy bourgeoisie and Wildens was to become distantly related to the famous artist when Rubens married Helena Fourment in 1630; their ties remained such that Rubens appointed him one of three who were to supervise the sale of his collection after his death in 1640.10E. Duverger, Fontes historiae Artis Neerlandicae Bronnen voor de Kunstgeschiedenis van de Nederlanden: Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Antwerpse kunstinventarissen uit de zeventiende eeuw, 13 vols., Brussels 1984-2004, IV, p. 346.

The couple lived in the Minderbroederstraat and their portraits by Anthony van Dyck (1599-1641) would have displayed their prosperous, social standing.11S.J. Barnes, N. de Poorter, O. Millar and H. Vey, Anthony van Dyck: A Complete Catalogue of the Paintings, New Haven (Conn.)/London 2004, no. 1.109; in fact, the portrait of Wildens has been cut down and the identification of the putative portrait of his wife and child (no. 110) may have to be called into question given the child’s age and new evidence about the date of Van Dyck’s departure for Italy, see the biography of Van Dyck under SK-A-102. Following the death of his mother in 1622 and of his wife two years later, Wildens moved into the former’s substantial property in the Lange Nieuwstraat. This was to house a large accumulation of paintings – presumably part collection part stock – and extensive other possessions which were recorded in the estate inventory of his only surviving son, Jeremias, who died 30 December 1653,12For the inventory, see E. Duverger, Fontes historiae Artis Neerlandicae Bronnen voor de Kunstgeschiedenis van de Nederlanden: Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Antwerpse kunstinventarissen uit de zeventiende eeuw, 13 vols., Brussels 1984-2004, VI, pp. 475-504. and whom he had predeceased on 16 October of that year.13W. Adler, Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Rubens, Fridingen 1980, p. 75 under n. 25, reproduces the recorded inscription on Wildens’s father and son’s tombstone in the Onze-Lieve-Vrouwekerk. There were no direct heirs as Jan had not remarried and Jeremias, at 32, was still a bachelor.

Wildens’s preference was to work on a large scale but there are only extant or recorded, signed and dated works for 1614, 1619, 1624, 1625, 1631 and 1636 (see below).14W. Adler, Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Rubens, Fridingen 1980, nos. G.13 (sic, should be the painting cited in note 5), 39, 42, 43, 47, 68. His extant painted oeuvre may not be large.15W. Adler, Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Rubens, Fridingen 1980, optimistically lists 120 paintings. Cornelis de Bie saw his work only in relation to Rubens16C. de Bie, Het gulden cabinet van de edel vrij schilder const, inhoudende den lof vande vermartste schilders, architecte, beldtowers ende plaetsnijders van deze eeuwe, Antwerp s.a. (1662), p. 126. and it is chiefly as his collaborator in the provision of landscape backgrounds that Wildens is known. The estate inventory provides some small evidence of this collaboration,17No. 139 of the estate inventory (see E. Duverger, Fontes historiae Artis Neerlandicae Bronnen voor de Kunstgeschiedenis van de Nederlanden: Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Antwerpse kunstinventarissen uit de zeventiende eeuw, 13 vols., Brussels 1984-2004, VI, pp. 475-504) was a Pan and Syrinx by Rubens and Wildens, for landscapes attributed to Wildens in figure compositions by Rubens, see inter alia E. McGrath, Corpus Rubenianum Ludwig Burchard, XIII (1): Subjects from History, 2 vols., London 1997, II, under no. 56, and A. Balis, Corpus Rubenianum Ludwig Burchard, XVIII: Landscapes and Hunting Scenes, 2: Hunting Scenes, Oxford 1986, pp. 42-43; for work in collaboration with Anthony van Dyck, see S.J. Barnes, N. de Poorter, O. Millar and H. Vey, Anthony van Dyck: A Complete Catalogue of the Paintings, New Haven (Conn.)/London 2004, no. III,8, with Frans Snijders, see P. Sutton et al., The Age of Rubens, exh. cat. Boston (Museum of Fine Arts)/Toledo (Museum of Art) 1993-94, nos. 188-120; and with Abraham Janssens I, e.g. Venus and Adonis, see Verzeichnis der Gemälde, coll. cat. Vienna (Kunsthistorisches Museum) 1973, p. 93 and Musée des Beaux Arts de Dunkerkque, accession no. CA2001.001.3. but his undocumented work with Rubens and other artist is thought to have been quite extensive. Adler records passes to travel abroad, issued to him in 1632, 1635, 1641, 1642,18W. Adler, Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Rubens, Fridingen 1980, p. 12. maybe to attend the Paris fair as a picture dealer, and the ninety-six packets of pigments separately listed in his office in the inventory of 1653,19E. Duverger, Fontes historiae Artis Neerlandicae Bronnen voor de Kunstgeschiedenis van de Nederlanden: Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Antwerpse kunstinventarissen uit de zeventiende eeuw, 13 vols., Brussels 1984-2004, VI, pp. 498-500. also suggests that he acted as an artist’s colour-man.

His portrait by Van Dyck of the 1630s was engraved by Paulus Pontius (1603-1658) accompanied by the same epithet as given to other landscape specialists in the Iconography, ‘painter of rural views’;20S. Turner and C. Depauw, The New Hollstein Dutch and Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts, 1450-1700: Anthony van Dyck, 8 vols., Rotterdam 2002, II, no. 102. in fact, Wildens was also a competent figure painter21Evident in the rendering of the hunter in the Dresden and Hermitage paintings, W. Adler, Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Rubens, Fridingen 1980, nos. G.41 and 43; the Marquès de Leganés (1580-1655) owned by 1637 a set of twelve Sybils by Wildens (approx. 110 x 84 cm), of which the whereabouts of two are known, see J.J. Pérez Preciado, El Marqués de Leganés y las Artes, 2 vols., Madrid 2010 (diss. Universidad Complutense; eprints.ucm.es/10555), II, nos. 382-393. and a still life by him was listed after his death in the house in the Lange Nieuwstraat.22No. 631 of the estate inventory, see E. Duverger, Fontes historiae Artis Neerlandicae Bronnen voor de Kunstgeschiedenis van de Nederlanden: Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Antwerpse kunstinventarissen uit de zeventiende eeuw, 13 vols., Brussels 1984-2004, VI, pp. 475-504.

REFERENCES
W. Adler, Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Rubens, Fridingen 1980

Entry

The view is of the city of Antwerp from the east taken from a point above and between the two roads then known as ‘De Straet over Lanteren-hof’ and that on the left ‘den Steenwech’ in the direction of Berchem. Maps were available which could have served as an aide-mémoire.23For instance, by 1) Frans Huys of 1557, see A.J.J. Delen, Iconographie van Antwerpen, Brussels 1930, p. 78, no. 35; 2) a vignette bottom, centre right in C.J. Visscher of 1624, see Ibid., p. 131, no. 236 (but see F.W.H. Hollstein et al., Dutch and Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts 1450-1700, Amsterdam/Roosendaal 1948-, XXXVIII, where Visscher is credited with only part of the engraving and no date is given; the British Library copy is so dated); 3) Pieter Verbiest II (1605-93), Hollstein XXXV, no. 2, p. 185 (but to be dated 1662). A map of the city from the east of 1635 was also published in C. Gevartius, Pompa Introitus Ferdinandi Austriaci Hispaniarum Infantis, Antwerp 1641 (facsimile ed. Amsterdam 1971). In the centre, middle distance, is the Sint-Jorispoort or the Keizerspoort, built between 1542-54; to the north extends the city wall built in the same period also in white stone, and much praised by Ludovico Guiccardini in 1567.24L. Guicciardini, Description de la cite d’Anvers …, Antwerp 1920, pp. 33-35. To the left extending southwards to the citadel is the earth rampart topped by a fence, known as ‘Joincte’, measures for the erection of which were taken by the Archduchess Isabella in 1625.25P. Génard, Anvers à travers les Âges, 2 vols., Brussels s.a. (1888), I, pp. 97-98, II, p. 79. The remnants of the stone defences were removed in 1860-63.

The spires, set against the skyline, may be identified, from the left, as those of Sint-Michielsabdij, the Sint-Joriskerk, Sint-Andrieskerk, Onze-Lieve-Vrouwekerk, the Karmelitenbroedersklooster, Sint-Jacobskerk and of the Klooster der Predikheren. Couvreur gives a detailed description,26W. Couvreur (ed.), Antwerpen in de XVIIde Eeuw, s.l. (Antwerp) 1989, p. 494. based chiefly on the Brussels version (for which see below). Before the Sint-Jorispoort can be made out a watering place for horses. Maps are inconsistent about the number and location of windmills beside the approach roads (one is surpressed in the present painting, while none occurs in the Brussels version referred to below); but in some maps is marked a tower also, suppressed in the present painting, referred to above, identified simply as ‘Redout’ on the Berchem road, nearly opposite the Sint-Jorispoort.

It has recently been shown that the Marquès de Leganés (1580-1655) acquired ‘two Antwerp views from the land side and another from the water side by Wildens…’ during his brief tour of duty in the Spanish Netherlands in the winter of 1634-35.27Author’s translation from J.J. Pérez Preciado, El Marqués de Leganés y las Artes, 2 vols., Madrid 2010 (diss. Universidad Complutense; eprints.ucm.es/10555), II, pp. 100-02, nos. 112-113: ‘Dos villas de anberes por la parte de tierra y otra por la parte del agua original de Wildens...’; claimed to have been bought by Leganés before 1634; but see below. The latter view has been identified as that in the Brussels museum;28H. Pauwels (ed.), Catalogue inventaire de la peinture ancienne, Brussels (Koninklijke Musea voor Schone Kunsten van België) 1984, p. 329, no. 3068; W. Adler, Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Rubens, Fridingen 1980, no. G.73. This and related views, see below, are claimed to show the arrival of the Dowager Queen of France, Marie de Médicis, in Antwerp. This took place on 4 September 1631, and so if correctly identified, the work could not have been acquired by Leganés in 1630/31, as suggested by Peréz Preciado, see previous note, as Leganés left the Spanish Netherlands in January. the whereabouts of the former ‘to the land side’ is not known. Also unknown are the whereabouts of the ‘two large canvas paintings showing the water and land sides of this city’ for which, as recorded in the accounts of the city of Antwerp for 23 May 1635, a payment was to be made to Jan Wildens.29Author’s translation from W. Adler, Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Rubens, Fridingen 1980, pp. 85-86, note 223: ‘twee groote doecken schilderye, wesende de water ende landtsyde deser stadt…’. These were supposedly for the Cardinal-Infante Ferdinand, who made his Joyous Entry into the city on 17 April 1635. As the present painting is signed and dated 1636 it may be presumed to be a near replica (having regard to the pentiments in the foreground) of those previously executed; three other similar views are extant, see below.

The 1653/54 inventory of the estate of Jeremias Wildens, who died soon after his father Jan, lists four pendant views presumably similar to those earlier painted; these are not specified as by Jan – as occurs with other paintings in the inventory – and so are most likely replicas by Jeremias.30 E. Duverger, Fontes historiae Artis Neerlandicae Bronnen voor de Kunstgeschiedenis van de Nederlanden: Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Antwerpse kunstinventarissen uit de zeventiende eeuw, 13 vols., Brussels 1984-2004, VI, pp. 482-83, nos. 162-65, p. 487, nos. 318-19, nos. 348-49. Pendant views, but smaller than the Rijksmuseum picture, were on the London market in 1972.31 Warwick Borough Library sale, London (Christie’s), 28 April 1972, nos. 69, 70; W. Adler, Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Rubens, Fridingen 1980, pp. 108-09, nos. 69, 70. Whether there was a pendant to the present work, a view of the city from across the Scheldt – ‘naer de watersijde’ – is not known. Four other views of the city, of approximately the same size, two from each viewpoint are known, of these, two, in the Brussels museum, already constitute a pair;32H. Pauwels (ed.), Catalogue inventaire de la peinture ancienne, Brussels (Koninklijke Musea voor Schone Kunsten van België) 1984, nos. 5063 and 5064, 177 x 386 cm and 180 x 341 cm respectively; W. Adler, Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Rubens, Fridingen 1980, p. 109, nos. G.74 and 71. the two others are in the Dieppe museum33Dieppe, Musée Municipal, 188 x 362 cm (photograph in Louvre Documentation). and in the Nationaal Scheepvaartmuseum, Antwerp (on loan).34Catalogus Schilderkunst, Oude Meesters, Antwerp (Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten) 1988, p. 284, no. 300 as Peeters, 180 x 350 cm; W. Adler, Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Rubens, Fridingen 1980, p. 109, no. G.72. The river views are all said to record the arrival of the Dowager Queen Marie de Médicis at Antwerp in September 1631; so it is likely that a pendant to the present painting of 1636 would have done the same. However, this latter could have been executed and /or sold without a pendant; a single such view – although not specified as by Wildens – was listed ‘voor de schouwe’, on the mantelpiece, in the inventory of an Antwerp estate of 1661.35E. Duverger, Fontes historiae Artis Neerlandicae Bronnen voor de Kunstgeschiedenis van de Nederlanden: Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Antwerpse kunstinventarissen uit de zeventiende eeuw, 13 vols., Brussels 1984-2004, VIII, p. 203.

Wildens is thought to have supplied landscape backgrounds for figure painters, and perhaps towards the end of his career other artists supplied the staffage for his own landscapes.36For instance, David Teniers II (W. Adler, _Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Ruben_s, Fridingen 1980, no. G.75) or Hans Jordaens III (Ibid., no. G.65 and N. Gritsay and N. Babina, State Hermitage Museum Catalogue: Seventeenth- and Eighteenth-Century Flemish Painting, St Petersburg 2008, pp. 430-31, no. 530). But he early developed his own manner of executing figures and animals on a small scale, thus not relying on others.37Wildens also supplied figures for landscapes by other artists, as for instance by J. de Momper (see the work of collaboration listed as no. 490 in the Wildens inventory of 1653/54, E. Duverger, Fontes historiae Artis Neerlandicae Bronnen voor de Kunstgeschiedenis van de Nederlanden: Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Antwerpse kunstinventarissen uit de zeventiende eeuw, 13 vols., Brussels 1984-2004, VI, no. 490). The figures in the present painting conform to his generally accepted manner as demonstrated for instance in the Month of July of 1614 executed when he was in Italy.38S.J. Barnes et al., Van Dyck a Genova: Grande pittura e collezionismo, exh. cat. Genoa (Palazzo Ducale) 1997, no. 91a.

The 1653/54 inventory refers to landscapes most likely by Jeremias, but presumably following his father’s example, as yet ‘ungestoffert’,39E. Duverger, Fontes historiae Artis Neerlandicae Bronnen voor de Kunstgeschiedenis van de Nederlanden: Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Antwerpse kunstinventarissen uit de zeventiende eeuw, 13 vols., Brussels 1984-2004, VI, pp. 482-83. that is without the staffage having been introduced. The arrangement of figures and animals in the extant views of Antwerp from the land side follow the same general pattern; this might have been the case already in the lost painting owned by Leganés and those destined for the Cardinal-Infante but it is impossible to say for certain. The variations in the disposition of the ‘better sort’ promenading in the bottom left-hand corners may have been requested by, and have had a particular reference to, prospective owners.

The peasants in the foreground are engaged in autumnal work: harvesting root crops, sowing and picking fruit. The peasant digging in the foreground is a quotation from a print by Jan Saenredam (1565-1607) after Abraham Bloemaert (1566-1651).40M. Roethlisberger and M.-J. Bok, Abraham Bloemaert and his Sons: Paintings and Prints, 2 vols., Doornspijk 1993, I, no. 76, II, fig. 131.

Gregory Martin, 2022

Literature

W. Adler, Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Rubens, Fridingen 1980, p. 108, no. G.68; Couvreur, ‘Ikonografie’, in W. Couvreur (ed.), Antwerpen in de XVIIde Eeuw, s.l. [Antwerp] 1989, p. 494, no. 5, fig 6a

Collection catalogues

1887, p. 190, no. 1630; 1903, p. 299, no. 2679; 1934, p. 318, no. 2679; 1976, p. 605, no. A 616

Citation

G. Martin, 2022, 'Jan Wildens, Panoramic View of Antwerp from the East, 1636', in Flemish Paintings in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: https://data.rijksmuseum.nl/200108587

(accessed 10 December 2025 22:15:23).

Footnotes

  • 1NHA, ARS, Kop, inv. 38, pp. 99-100 (20 February 1852); NHA, ARS, IS, inv. 24, no. 89 (3 March 1852); NHA, ARS, Kop, inv. 38, p. 105 (7 May 1852). Jan Six, email 18 February 2015, kindly states that the picture is not listed in earlier Six inventories (nor was it part of the Van Winter collection, for which see R. Priem, ‘The ‘Most Excellent Collection’ of Lucretia Johanna van Winter: The Years 1809-22, with a Catalogue of the Works Purchased’, Simiolus 25 (1997) pp. 103-235, esp. pp. 103ff.).
  • 2For example A. van der Willigen and F.G. Meijer, A Dictionary of Dutch and Flemish Still-Life Painters Working in Oils, 1525-1725, Leiden 2003, p. 213; W. Adler, Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Rubens, Fridingen 1980, p. 12 gives the date as 1585/1586; the RKD proposes 1584/86.
  • 3P. Rombouts and T. van Lerius, De Liggeren en andere historische archieven der Antwerpsche Sint Lucasgilde, ondere zinspreuk: ‘Wt Ionsten Versaemt’, 2 vols., Antwerp/The Hague 1864-76, I, pp. 394, 425.
  • 4P. Rombouts and T. van Lerius, De Liggeren en andere historische archieven der Antwerpsche Sint Lucasgilde, ondere zinspreuk: ‘Wt Ionsten Versaemt’, 2 vols., Antwerp/The Hague 1864-76, I, p. 466.
  • 5F.J. van den Branden, Geschiedenis der Antwerpsche schilderschool, 3 vols., Antwerp 1883, II, p. 202.
  • 6S.J. Barnes et al., Van Dyck a Genova: Grande pittura e collezionismo, exh. cat. Genoa (Palazzo Ducale) 1997, no. 91a.
  • 7The Jesuit and art adviser George Gage (? 1528-1638) in a letter to Sir Dudley Carleton (1573-1632) of 14 March 1617 may have been referring to him when he wrote of ‘the rarest man living in Landscape’ lately in Italy and in Antwerp by the previous year, see C. Ruelens and M. Rooses (eds.), Correspondance de Rubens et documents epistolaires concernant sa vie et ses oeuvres, 6 vols., Antwerp 1887-1909, II, p. 104.
  • 8F.J. van den Branden, Geschiedenis der Antwerpsche schilderschool, 3 vols., Antwerp 1883, II, p. 202.
  • 9Nos. 506 and 190 of the Wildens estate inventory, E. Duverger, Fontes historiae Artis Neerlandicae Bronnen voor de Kunstgeschiedenis van de Nederlanden: Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Antwerpse kunstinventarissen uit de zeventiende eeuw, 13 vols., Brussels 1984-2004, VI, pp. 491 and 484.
  • 10E. Duverger, Fontes historiae Artis Neerlandicae Bronnen voor de Kunstgeschiedenis van de Nederlanden: Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Antwerpse kunstinventarissen uit de zeventiende eeuw, 13 vols., Brussels 1984-2004, IV, p. 346.
  • 11S.J. Barnes, N. de Poorter, O. Millar and H. Vey, Anthony van Dyck: A Complete Catalogue of the Paintings, New Haven (Conn.)/London 2004, no. 1.109; in fact, the portrait of Wildens has been cut down and the identification of the putative portrait of his wife and child (no. 110) may have to be called into question given the child’s age and new evidence about the date of Van Dyck’s departure for Italy, see the biography of Van Dyck under SK-A-102.
  • 12For the inventory, see E. Duverger, Fontes historiae Artis Neerlandicae Bronnen voor de Kunstgeschiedenis van de Nederlanden: Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Antwerpse kunstinventarissen uit de zeventiende eeuw, 13 vols., Brussels 1984-2004, VI, pp. 475-504.
  • 13W. Adler, Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Rubens, Fridingen 1980, p. 75 under n. 25, reproduces the recorded inscription on Wildens’s father and son’s tombstone in the Onze-Lieve-Vrouwekerk.
  • 14W. Adler, Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Rubens, Fridingen 1980, nos. G.13 (sic, should be the painting cited in note 5), 39, 42, 43, 47, 68.
  • 15W. Adler, Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Rubens, Fridingen 1980, optimistically lists 120 paintings.
  • 16C. de Bie, Het gulden cabinet van de edel vrij schilder const, inhoudende den lof vande vermartste schilders, architecte, beldtowers ende plaetsnijders van deze eeuwe, Antwerp s.a. (1662), p. 126.
  • 17No. 139 of the estate inventory (see E. Duverger, Fontes historiae Artis Neerlandicae Bronnen voor de Kunstgeschiedenis van de Nederlanden: Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Antwerpse kunstinventarissen uit de zeventiende eeuw, 13 vols., Brussels 1984-2004, VI, pp. 475-504) was a Pan and Syrinx by Rubens and Wildens, for landscapes attributed to Wildens in figure compositions by Rubens, see inter alia E. McGrath, Corpus Rubenianum Ludwig Burchard, XIII (1): Subjects from History, 2 vols., London 1997, II, under no. 56, and A. Balis, Corpus Rubenianum Ludwig Burchard, XVIII: Landscapes and Hunting Scenes, 2: Hunting Scenes, Oxford 1986, pp. 42-43; for work in collaboration with Anthony van Dyck, see S.J. Barnes, N. de Poorter, O. Millar and H. Vey, Anthony van Dyck: A Complete Catalogue of the Paintings, New Haven (Conn.)/London 2004, no. III,8, with Frans Snijders, see P. Sutton et al., The Age of Rubens, exh. cat. Boston (Museum of Fine Arts)/Toledo (Museum of Art) 1993-94, nos. 188-120; and with Abraham Janssens I, e.g. Venus and Adonis, see Verzeichnis der Gemälde, coll. cat. Vienna (Kunsthistorisches Museum) 1973, p. 93 and Musée des Beaux Arts de Dunkerkque, accession no. CA2001.001.3.
  • 18W. Adler, Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Rubens, Fridingen 1980, p. 12.
  • 19E. Duverger, Fontes historiae Artis Neerlandicae Bronnen voor de Kunstgeschiedenis van de Nederlanden: Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Antwerpse kunstinventarissen uit de zeventiende eeuw, 13 vols., Brussels 1984-2004, VI, pp. 498-500.
  • 20S. Turner and C. Depauw, The New Hollstein Dutch and Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts, 1450-1700: Anthony van Dyck, 8 vols., Rotterdam 2002, II, no. 102.
  • 21Evident in the rendering of the hunter in the Dresden and Hermitage paintings, W. Adler, Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Rubens, Fridingen 1980, nos. G.41 and 43; the Marquès de Leganés (1580-1655) owned by 1637 a set of twelve Sybils by Wildens (approx. 110 x 84 cm), of which the whereabouts of two are known, see J.J. Pérez Preciado, El Marqués de Leganés y las Artes, 2 vols., Madrid 2010 (diss. Universidad Complutense; eprints.ucm.es/10555), II, nos. 382-393.
  • 22No. 631 of the estate inventory, see E. Duverger, Fontes historiae Artis Neerlandicae Bronnen voor de Kunstgeschiedenis van de Nederlanden: Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Antwerpse kunstinventarissen uit de zeventiende eeuw, 13 vols., Brussels 1984-2004, VI, pp. 475-504.
  • 23For instance, by 1) Frans Huys of 1557, see A.J.J. Delen, Iconographie van Antwerpen, Brussels 1930, p. 78, no. 35; 2) a vignette bottom, centre right in C.J. Visscher of 1624, see Ibid., p. 131, no. 236 (but see F.W.H. Hollstein et al., Dutch and Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts 1450-1700, Amsterdam/Roosendaal 1948-, XXXVIII, where Visscher is credited with only part of the engraving and no date is given; the British Library copy is so dated); 3) Pieter Verbiest II (1605-93), Hollstein XXXV, no. 2, p. 185 (but to be dated 1662). A map of the city from the east of 1635 was also published in C. Gevartius, Pompa Introitus Ferdinandi Austriaci Hispaniarum Infantis, Antwerp 1641 (facsimile ed. Amsterdam 1971).
  • 24L. Guicciardini, Description de la cite d’Anvers …, Antwerp 1920, pp. 33-35.
  • 25P. Génard, Anvers à travers les Âges, 2 vols., Brussels s.a. (1888), I, pp. 97-98, II, p. 79.
  • 26W. Couvreur (ed.), Antwerpen in de XVIIde Eeuw, s.l. (Antwerp) 1989, p. 494.
  • 27Author’s translation from J.J. Pérez Preciado, El Marqués de Leganés y las Artes, 2 vols., Madrid 2010 (diss. Universidad Complutense; eprints.ucm.es/10555), II, pp. 100-02, nos. 112-113: ‘Dos villas de anberes por la parte de tierra y otra por la parte del agua original de Wildens...’; claimed to have been bought by Leganés before 1634; but see below.
  • 28H. Pauwels (ed.), Catalogue inventaire de la peinture ancienne, Brussels (Koninklijke Musea voor Schone Kunsten van België) 1984, p. 329, no. 3068; W. Adler, Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Rubens, Fridingen 1980, no. G.73. This and related views, see below, are claimed to show the arrival of the Dowager Queen of France, Marie de Médicis, in Antwerp. This took place on 4 September 1631, and so if correctly identified, the work could not have been acquired by Leganés in 1630/31, as suggested by Peréz Preciado, see previous note, as Leganés left the Spanish Netherlands in January.
  • 29Author’s translation from W. Adler, Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Rubens, Fridingen 1980, pp. 85-86, note 223: ‘twee groote doecken schilderye, wesende de water ende landtsyde deser stadt…’.
  • 30E. Duverger, Fontes historiae Artis Neerlandicae Bronnen voor de Kunstgeschiedenis van de Nederlanden: Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Antwerpse kunstinventarissen uit de zeventiende eeuw, 13 vols., Brussels 1984-2004, VI, pp. 482-83, nos. 162-65, p. 487, nos. 318-19, nos. 348-49.
  • 31Warwick Borough Library sale, London (Christie’s), 28 April 1972, nos. 69, 70; W. Adler, Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Rubens, Fridingen 1980, pp. 108-09, nos. 69, 70.
  • 32H. Pauwels (ed.), Catalogue inventaire de la peinture ancienne, Brussels (Koninklijke Musea voor Schone Kunsten van België) 1984, nos. 5063 and 5064, 177 x 386 cm and 180 x 341 cm respectively; W. Adler, Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Rubens, Fridingen 1980, p. 109, nos. G.74 and 71.
  • 33Dieppe, Musée Municipal, 188 x 362 cm (photograph in Louvre Documentation).
  • 34Catalogus Schilderkunst, Oude Meesters, Antwerp (Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten) 1988, p. 284, no. 300 as Peeters, 180 x 350 cm; W. Adler, Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Rubens, Fridingen 1980, p. 109, no. G.72.
  • 35E. Duverger, Fontes historiae Artis Neerlandicae Bronnen voor de Kunstgeschiedenis van de Nederlanden: Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Antwerpse kunstinventarissen uit de zeventiende eeuw, 13 vols., Brussels 1984-2004, VIII, p. 203.
  • 36For instance, David Teniers II (W. Adler, Jan Wildens: Der Landschaftsmitarbeiter des Rubens, Fridingen 1980, no. G.75) or Hans Jordaens III (Ibid., no. G.65 and N. Gritsay and N. Babina, State Hermitage Museum Catalogue: Seventeenth- and Eighteenth-Century Flemish Painting, St Petersburg 2008, pp. 430-31, no. 530).
  • 37Wildens also supplied figures for landscapes by other artists, as for instance by J. de Momper (see the work of collaboration listed as no. 490 in the Wildens inventory of 1653/54, E. Duverger, Fontes historiae Artis Neerlandicae Bronnen voor de Kunstgeschiedenis van de Nederlanden: Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Antwerpse kunstinventarissen uit de zeventiende eeuw, 13 vols., Brussels 1984-2004, VI, no. 490).
  • 38S.J. Barnes et al., Van Dyck a Genova: Grande pittura e collezionismo, exh. cat. Genoa (Palazzo Ducale) 1997, no. 91a.
  • 39E. Duverger, Fontes historiae Artis Neerlandicae Bronnen voor de Kunstgeschiedenis van de Nederlanden: Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Antwerpse kunstinventarissen uit de zeventiende eeuw, 13 vols., Brussels 1984-2004, VI, pp. 482-83.
  • 40M. Roethlisberger and M.-J. Bok, Abraham Bloemaert and his Sons: Paintings and Prints, 2 vols., Doornspijk 1993, I, no. 76, II, fig. 131.