Jan Jiří Heinsch

Heinsch primarily painted religious-themed works (including altarpieces) as well as portraits of monastic superiors – especially for various Catholic religious orders such as the Jesuits, Knights of the Cross with the Red Star or Augustinians.

Heinsch was born in 1647 in Kłodzko (Glatz), the capital of the County of Kladsko (then part of Bohemia proper, now in Silesia, southern Poland), to a Protestant family.

In 1708, he entered the Augustinian monastery in Bělá pod Bezdězem in northern Bohemia, but before the end of the trial period he left; yet later painted several works for this institution.

In 1710, produced the design for a statue of St. Francis Borgia on the Charles Bridge, but it was later sculpted by another Czech-German artist, Ferdinand Maxmilián Brokoff.

In addition to Prague, his legacy is scattered throughout Bohemia and some examples also can be found in southern Moravia (churches in Brno and Uherské Hradiště).