Frederik Hendrik is mounted on a rearing dapple-grey in the left foreground during the Siege of ’s-Hertogenbosch in 1629. He is surrounded by six other prominent figures, one of whom is probably Ernst Casimir. Behind them are their headquarters near Vught, with the St Lambertuskerk. The cartographic nature of the landscape matches that in The Defeated Spanish Garrison Leaving ’s-Hertogenbosch (SK-A-435), which Hofstede de Groot regarded as its companion piece.
The only person to question the attribution to Van Hillegaert has been Hofstede de Groot, who gave the painting to Henri Ambrosius Pacx instead. The style, however, is fully in keeping with that of signed works by Van Hillegaert, most notably in the distinctive horses, the dogs with their elongated legs, and the blue-green tints of the background.
Van Hillegaert depicted the siege and capture of ’s-Hertogenbosch in various ways: as equestrian portraits of Frederik Hendrik with the city in the background, and as small-figured siege scenes with either a cartographic landscape or a realistic, panoramic landscape. There is a version of this composition signed by Van Hillegaert and dated 1631 in Paleis Het Loo (fig. a). Although the two paintings are not identical, the similarities are so great that the Rijksmuseum work can be dated around the same time. That is also confirmed by the fact that Van Hillegaert very probably based his depiction of the fortifications in the background on the maps of the siege published by Jacques Prempart in 1630.
Interestingly, the Museo Nazionale di Capodimonte in Naples has another version signed by Henri Ambrosius Pacx and dated 1632 (fig. b). In view of the later date it can be assumed that Van Hillegaert was the inventor of the composition. Pacx’s use of it shows, in any event, that he was well acquainted with Van Hillegaert’s work, but the precise nature of the relationship between the two artists remains unclear.
Yvette Bruijnen, 2007
See Bibliography and Rijksmuseum painting catalogues
See Key to abbreviations and Acknowledgements
This entry was published in J. Bikker (ed.), Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth Century in the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, I: Artists Born between 1570 and 1600, coll. cat. Amsterdam 2007, no. 127.
