Franciscus de Neve (II)

He had an international career in Italy, Southern Germany and Austria where he worked for aristocratic patrons and churches; He returned to his native Flanders later in his life.

Only recently have art historians attempted to disentangle the biographies and oeuvres of father and son de Neve.

He then travelled to Austria where between the years 1669 and 1689 he painted altarpieces commissioned by the Archbishop of Salzburg and the Benedictine abbeys of Kremsmünster, Garsten and Admont.

The painter was already at the time of his stay in Rome known for his Roman landscapes and in particular for his detailed rendering of trees and foliage.

A large number of small, unsigned landscapes has been handed down almost exclusively in engravings, which were made by Giovanni Giacomo de Rossi alla Pace in the 1660s in Rome.

[1] His altarpieces are in a style, which mixes Flemish, Venetian and Roman classical models derived from Rubens, Raphael, Titian, Tintoretto, Poussin and Pietro da Cortona.

The colour schemes of his oil paintings as well as his portrait art, which has mainly been preserved in copper engravings, were highly regarded by his contemporaries.

[1] On various grounds and in particular its provenance, the art historian Brigitte Fassbinder has argued that the painting Massacre of the Innocents attributed to Rubens and dated 1611-12 is in fact by de Neve.