Bonaventura van Overbeek

Bonaventura van Overbeek (1660–1705) was a Dutch Golden Age draughtsman and engraver.

According to Houbraken, he drew the Roman ruins from life and, while in Rome, he joined the Bentvueghels with the nickname Romulus.

[2] According to the RKD his cousin Michiel van Overbeke published his prints after his death (Reliquiae antiquiae urbis Romae, Amsterdam 1708).

He travelled to Rome and drew the antiquities, and after he returned was welcomed back by De Lairesse, who took him in.

He started to collect plaster casts and drawings, with a view to writing a book on art history.

Portrait of Overbeek portrayed with one of his etchings in his Les restes de l'ancienne Rome in 1709, after a painting by Jacob Christoph Le Blon and engraved by Cornelis Vermeulen .
Portrait lower left in Jan van Gool 's Nieuw schouburg by Aart Schouman based on Overbeek's Les restes de l'ancienne Rome in 1709.
Lateran Obelisk in Volume 2 of his Antique relics of Rome , showing the state of Domenico Fontana 's fountain as it then was in 1709