Gerrit Schouten

[2] Schouten was born in Paramaribo, the capital of Surinam, then a Dutch colony.

The son of Hendrik Schouten, a Dutch government clerk, and Suzanna Hanssen, a free black woman, he was an autodidact and taught himself how to paint.

[3] Many of his dioramas depict dus, dance parties practiced by the black enslaved populations in Suriname.

These performances, conducted in the Surinamese creole language Sranan Tongo enabled the groups to exchange information and criticize the colonial regime that enslaved them.

In 1835, he offered a butterfly painting to William, Prince of Orange during his visit to Suriname.