Jan van Mieris
Jan van Mieris paid 3 guilders, half of the regular entry price, because he was the son of a master (Aono, 2014, p. 177).
The work of Jan van Mieris was loved by collectors with great names, amongst them the De la Court family from Leiden (Vogelaar, 2014, p. 22).
The archive of the Leiden Remonstrant Church shows that Jan lived with his mother on the Oude Vest for a short period.
He was invited to the court of Cosimo III de Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany, by friends of his father, but because of religious grounds, he was sent off (Van Gool, 1751, vol.
In that city, Jan found himself in the company of a group of young painters with a bad reputation, probably the so-called Bentvueghels, and his condition worsened, but he continued to work for as long as he could (Aono, 2014, p. 177).
This is evidenced by the fact that the majority of Jan van Mieris' work came from three passionate collectors of this family: Petronella Oortmans-De la Court, her much younger cousin Pieter de la Court van der Voort from Leiden, and his son Allard (Sluijter et al., 1989, p. 288).
He had previously made a commissioned painting for Cosimo III de Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany, for the Galleria Vasariana.
Therefore, this led Frans van Mieris to be later invited to the Court by his father's friends but he was sent off for religious reasons (Sluijter et al, 1988, p. 149).
This is seen in Jan's drawings, with a sketchy style that seems unexpected given his Leiden 'Fijnschilder' background, yet relatively recognizable, especially since his compositions have certain recurrent features (Tatenhove, 2007, p. 43).
Correspondingly, five of the six newly attributed drawings are centred around mythology or classical history: "Socrates and Xanthippe," "Paris and Oenone," "Belisarius as a blind beggar recognized by a soldier," "Cecrops' daughter discovers the serpent-shaped Erinchthonius" "Pandora handed over to Epimetheus by Mercury" and "The death of Lucretia" (Tatenhove, 2007, p. 43) Jan van Mieris was also a poet.
Media related to Jan van Mieris at Wikimedia Commons This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain: Rose, Hugh James (1857).
