Jacob Franquart
His father was a painter and draughtsman known for his religious subjects, landscapes and architectural scenes, who became a master in the Antwerp Guild of Saint Luke in 1571.
In Naples, Jacob the Elder started a collaboration with Wenceslas Cobergher, a Flemish painter who had trained in Antwerp with Maerten de Vos.
At this time the Archdukes Albert and Isabella invited Cobergher to work for them at the court in Brussels causing him to leave Italy with his family.
Rubens may also have acquired the book purely for practical reasons as at that time he was carrying out renovations on his newly purchased home in Antwerp.
[6] One month after the publication of Franquart's Premier Livre d'Architecture (Premier livre d'architecture de Iaques Francart : contenant diuerses inuentions de portes seruiables à tous ceux qui désirent bastir et pour sculpteurs, tailleurs de pieres, escriniers, massons et autres : en trois langues, in English First book of architecture of Jaques Francart : containing various inventions of doors useful to all those which wish to build and for sculptors, stone cutters, manufacturers of cases, masons and others: in three languages), he was asked to complete the Jesuit Church in Brussels (destroyed in 1812).
[10] Like Coberghers unpublished treatise, Franquart's book made a significant contribution to the knowledge of the Italian tradition in the Southern Netherlands.
[11] In 1622, he published in Brussels the Cent tablettes et escussons d'armes or Hondert schryftafelkens ende wapeschilden (One hundred plaques and escutcheons of arms).
The subtitle of the book was pour sculpteurs, peintres et orfebvres, pour s'en servir aux ornemens d'inscriptions, emblemes et armes (for sculptors, painters and goldsmiths, to be used for inscriptions, emblems and coats of arms), showing that the intention of the book was to serve as guidelines for painters, sculptors and goldsmiths.
[12] Franquart's Jesuit Church also incorporated local traditions as the facade hid a Flemish Late Gothic building (in part inherited from Hoeimaker's original design) characterised by its verticalism and interior rib-vaulting.
Tuscan columns carried the rib-vaults, decorated in the centre by escutcheons, a treatment of the nave that was echoed by many, including Huyssens at St. Walburga Church in Bruges.
[4] In 1620, Franquart designed the Temple of the Augustinians, which stood on the present-day Place de Brouckère/De Brouckèreplein in central Brussels, from its completion in 1642 until its demolition in 1893–94.
The reconstructed facade of the building now forms part of the Church of the Holy Trinity on the Parvis de la Trinité/Drievuldigheidsvoorplein in the Brussels municipality of Ixelles.
[13] Various elements of his design, including the use of consecutive double columns, broken frontons and boldly decorated light-openings in various shapes, established a new architectural style that became known as Brabantine Baroque.
The interior of which is characterised by the round-arched arcades with Corinthian pilasters supporting an entablature, as in the Our Lady of St. Peter's Church in Ghent designed by Huyssens.
He designed the various decorations and monumental, ephemeral architecture and structures for the funeral of Archduke Albert held in the Church of St. Gudula in Brussels on 12 March 1622.
[14] Franquart designed the catafalque below which the body of the Archduchess Isabella Clara was laid in the Church of St. James on Coudenberg in Brussels during her funeral ceremony on 3 March 1634.
A print of the catafalque made by Cornelis Galle the Elder shows the body of the Archduchess in the habit of the Poor Clares laid out in a four-poster bed, her crown beside her on the pillow.
[15] Franquart also designed the festive architecture in honour of the Joyous Entry into Ghent on 26 January 1635 of the Governor of the Habsburg Netherlands Cardinal-Infante Ferdinand of Austria.
The event itself was organised by the Jesuit College which provided research into emblems, allegories and classical Humanism to build the image of the Cardinal-Infante Ferdinand of Austria and to link him to Emperor Charles V, who was born in Ghent.
Cardinalis Triumphalis introitus in Flandriae Metropolim Gandavum written by the Jesuit Willem van der Beke (Guilielmus Becanus).
[16] Franquart designed the illustrations for a book commemorating the funeral ceremony of Archduke Albert held in the Church of St. Gudula in Brussels on 12 March 1622.
The title of the book is Pompa funebris optimi potentissimiq[ue] principis Alberti Pii, Archiducis Austriae, ducis Burg.
&c.[17] While the work was published in Brussels at the Jan Mommaert press, the copper engravings were cut by Antwerp's eminent printmaker Cornelis Galle the Elder.
The text was principally derived from the book Phoenix Principum... written by the Dutch writer and historian Erycius Puteanus and published in Leuven in 1622.
[14] He collaborated on a collection of biographies of prominent members of the Augustinian order published by Antwerp printer Joannes Cnobbaert under the title Virorum illustrium ex ordine eremitarum D. Augustini elogia : cum singulorvm expressis ad viuum iconibus.
In the 1620s, Archdukes Albert and Isabella commissioned Franquart, Rubens, Cobergher, Salomon de Claus and Jerôme Duquesnoy (II) to decorate their palace in Brussels.
