Cornelis de Vos

Cornelis de Vos , 1584-1651, Flemish portrait and figure painter. He was a contemporary of Rubens, who sent many sitters to him. Although of the school of Rubens, Vos developed an individual style of portraiture in which cool grays predominate. His representations of children were particularly successful. An example of his many portraits is that of Abraham Grapheus (Antwerp). His brother, Paulus de Vos, c.1596-1678, was an excellent painter of animals and hunting scenes. His paintings show the influence of his brother-in-law, Frans Snyders. His work is best seen in the museums of Madrid and St. Petersburg.

Vos, Cornelis de (b Hulst, ?1584; d Antwerp, 9 May 1651). Flemish painter, active in Antwerp. He painted historical, allegorical, mythological, and religious works, but excelled chiefly as a portraitist. His finest paintings are his portraits of children, which have great sensitivity and charm without lapsing into sentimentality. A splendid self-portrait of The Artist with his Family (1621, Mus. Royaux, Brussels) shows him looking happy and proud with his own children. In style he was close to Rubens and van Dyck but more down to earth (his sitters were typically solid members of the bourgeoisie rather than aristocrats or intellectuals). His brother Paul de Vos (b Hulst, ?1595; d Antwerp, 30 June 1678) painted hunting scenes and still-lifes in the style of Frans Snyders, who was the brother-in-law of the de Vos brothers. In 1637 all three helped Rubens execute pictures for the Torre de la Parada, Philip IV of Spain's (see Habsburg) hunting lodge near Madrid.