Jan Baptist Borrekens

It is possible he trained in the workshop of Rubens, which would explain why he was not mentioned as a pupil in the records of the Antwerp Guild of Saint Luke.

On 30 January 1636 he married Catharina Breugel, the daughter of the famous painter Jan Brueghel the Elder.

As a result of the marriage Borrekens became the brother in law of the prominent painter David Teniers the Younger who was the husband of a sister of his wife.

He was an art collector who owned many paintings of prominent Flemish masters of the 17th century as well as tapestries.

Rubens realized this important commission with the assistance of a large number of Antwerp painters such as Jacob Jordaens, Cornelis de Vos, Jan Cossiers, Peter Snayers, Thomas Willeboirts Bosschaert, Theodoor van Thulden, Jan Boeckhorst, Peeter Symons, Jacob Peter Gowy and others, who worked after Rubens' designs.

[6] The canvas which Borrekens created after a design by Rubens represents The apotheosis of Hercules and was in the collection of the Museo del Prado in Madrid before it was donated to the Fine Arts Museum of Coruña.