Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

Ferdinand Bol(Dordrecht 1616 – 1680 Amsterdam)

How to cite
Bakker, Piet. “Ferdinand Bol” (2017). Revised by Piet Bakker (2020). In The Leiden Collection Catalogue, 4th ed. Edited
by Arthur K. Wheelock Jr. and Elizabeth Nogrady with Caroline Van Cauwenberge. New York, 2023–.
https://theleidencollection.com/artists/ferdinand-bol/ (accessed November 10, 2024).
A PDF of every version of this biography is available in this Online Catalogue's Archive, and the Archive is managed bya permanent URL. New versions are added only when a substantive change to the narrative occurs.

© 2024 The Leiden Collection

Ferdinand Bol
Page 2 of 6

Ferdinand Bol was baptized in Dordrecht on 24 June 1616. His parents were the surgeon Balthasar Bol (d. 1641) andTanneke Fernandes.[1] We do not know from whom Bol received his first lessons in painting in his native city. A logicalcandidate is Jacob Gerritsz Cuyp (1594–1652), Dordrecht’s most esteemed and talented painter. The long-held assumptionthat Bol must also have studied for a while under a Utrecht master derives chiefly from an incorrect reading of thesignature on a “Bloemaert-like” Vertumnus from around 1635, which until recently was considered to be Bol’s first signed
painting.[2] In December 1635, he signed four notarial deeds in Dordrecht as “Ferdinandus bol, schilder” (Ferdinandus Bol,painter), indicating that he had completed his training by that year.
Soon thereafter, in 1636, Bol left his hometown and set off as a master painter for Amsterdam, where he worked underRembrandt van Rijn (1606–69), the first of the Dordrecht artists to do so.[3] Bol rapidly mastered Rembrandt’s style andsubsequently worked for a few years as a full-fledged assistant in his workshop on the Nieuwe Doelenstraat. The
documentary evidence for Bol’s association with Rembrandt includes an annotation on the verso of a drawing by
Rembrandt that can be dated around 1636.[4] This inscription in Rembrandt’s handwriting mentions the sale of work by“fardijnandus.” Furthermore, “Fernenandus Bol” also witnessed a document dated 30 August 1640, in which Rembrandtempowers a Frisian lawyer to settle an inheritance matter in Leeuwarden.
Bol probably worked with Rembrandt until shortly before 1642, the year of his earliest dated paintings.[5] Around thattime—possibly in 1641, when Bol’s father died—he established himself as an independent artist in Amsterdam andembarked on a successful career as a history and portrait painter. Like his teacher, he produced many tronies, the first ofwhich date from 1644 (see, for example, Man with a Fur-Trimmed Hat).[6] His work, especially his portraiture, wasstrongly indebted to Rembrandt’s style until around 1650. A telling example of this influence is the famous likeness ofElisabeth Bas (1571–1649), presently considered by most scholars to be an early portrait by Bol, but previously thought tobe an important work by Rembrandt.[7] He also adopted his master’s predilection for self-portraits: there are at least six
likenesses of Bol from the second half of the 1640s sporting a typical painter’s bonnet (see, for example, Self-Portrait,Behind a Parapet).[8]Bol’s growing reputation led to his first major commission, a portrait of the regents of the Lepers’ Asylum, in 1649.[9] The
palette of this group portrait strongly recalls that of Rembrandt, yet the poses of the regents foreshadow the elegance thatwould increasingly mark Bol’s portraits from 1650 on. Possibly with an eye to upcoming commissions for the prestigious
decorative program of the new town hall, Bol acquired citizenship of Amsterdam in 1652.[10] A year later, he executed his
first significant commission outside of Amsterdam: a group portrait of the officers of the Gouda civic guard.[11]Bol married Lysbeth Dell (1628–60) in October 1653, at which time he was recorded as living on the Oudezijds
Voorburgwal. Through Lysbeth’s father, Elbert Dell (1595–1667), a wine merchant and auctioneer of the Admiralty of
Amsterdam, and her mother, Cornelia Spiegel (1606–46), Bol gained entry into the Amsterdam patriciate.[12] His in-lawsthus played a pivotal role in the many prestigious and lucrative commissions he received from various municipal boards ofgovernors after his marriage, such as those from the burgomasters’ and aldermen’s chamber in the new town hall in theperiod when Lysbeth’s uncle, Hendrick Dirckz Spiegel (1598–1667), was burgomaster.[13]Bol did not secure these commissions solely through his influential relatives; his success was also due to his great talent. He
was present, along with his master, Rembrandt, in the Kloveniersdoelen in 1654 at a celebration held by the Guild of Saint
Luke, which inspired Jan Vos (1612–67) to write his paean to the leading Amsterdam painters of his day, including Bol.[14]© 2024 The Leiden Collection

Ferdinand BolPage 3 of 6

It was hardly a coincidence that virtually all of the painters who worked on the new town hall appeared in Vos’s poem. One
year later, in 1655, Bol was “head man” of the Guild of Saint Luke and in this capacity, together with the painter-dealerDavid Colijns (1582–1665/66), appraised a collection of paintings, a role he would assume on several other occasions aswell.[15] In 1658, he confessed, with Govaert Flinck (1615–60) and two other painters, to having drawn from nude female
models, which was illegal at the time.
Bol faced personal adversity in 1660 when his wife died just after giving birth to their son Balthasar (b. 1660).
Professionally, however, he remained very busy. In the first half of the 1660s, he received a number of commissions forgroup portraits of governors, as well as of individual sitters. He also landed a few important and lucrative commissions
outside of Amsterdam. The exceptionally wealthy Utrecht widow Jacoba Lampsins (1613/14–67) ordered fourmonumental history paintings for the salet (drawing room) of her house on the elegant Nieuwegracht.[16] He also painted alarge chimneypiece, Allegory on the Municipal Government of Leiden, for the burgomasters’ chamber of the Leiden town
hall in 1664.[17]Bol had so much work in the 1660s that it is difficult to imagine he did not have some form of assistance. How long Frans
van Ommeren served as Bol’s assistant is unknown, but a document from 1662 indicates that Van Ommeren was partly
responsible for the workshop production. In his Schouburgh, Houbraken mentioned two other pupils of Bol: Cornelis
Bisschop (1630–74) of Dordrecht, and the German painter Godfrey Kneller (1646–1723), who became the leading
portraitist in England after the death of Sir Peter Lely (1618–80).
On 10 October 1669, two days after Rembrandt’s burial, Bol took a second wife, Anna van Erckel (1624–80), theextraordinarily wealthy widow of Erasmus Scharlaken (ca. 1610–68), treasurer of the Admiralty of Amsterdam. They
were already acquainted, as Bol had portrayed her and Scharlaken as Isaac and Rebecca in a painting from ca. 1648.[18]According to his marriage settlement, Bol owned sixty paintings, and his possessions, partly belonging to his first wife,
were valued at a hefty 14,800 guilders.[19] Anna van Erckel was at least three times wealthier than he was; the couple wasso affluent, in fact, that Bol no longer had to earn a living. He seems to have stopped painting fairly soon after he married,
and lived chiefly off his investments. His last dated painting is from 1669.
Many of Bol’s final commissions stemmed from his good relations with the Admiralty. For instance, between 1667 and1669, he painted a series of portraits of Admiral Michiel Adriaensz de Ruyter (1607–76), whose popularity had reachedrecord heights in the Dutch Republic following his heroic expedition to Chatham.[20] In 1672, Bol exchanged his house on
the Oudezijds Voorburgwal for one on the Keizersgracht, between the Vijzelstraat and the Reguliersgracht. The direeconomic crisis after 1672 seems to have left him and his wife unscathed. When the 200th penny levy was charged in
1674, their initial fortune seems even to have increased. As befitting a man of his standing, he joined the boards of several
municipal institutions, and in 1675 Bol, the painter of so many regents, himself was portrayed as a member of the board of
the Old People’s Hospital in Amsterdam.[21] Anna van Erckel died in April 1680. Bol survived his wife by only a few
months and was buried in the Zuiderkerk on 24 July of that year.

- Piet Bakker, 2017; revised in 2020
© 2024 The Leiden Collection

Ferdinand Bol
Page 4 of 6Endnotes
1. Unless otherwise noted, all biographical information on Ferdinand Bol is taken from Albert
Blankert, Ferdinand Bol (1616–1680): Rembrandt’s Pupil (Doornspijk, 1982).
2. Albert Blankert, Ferdinand Bol (1616–1680): Rembrandt’s Pupil (Doornspijk, 1982), 16–17, no. 35. The
attribution to Bol can no longer be sustained, as the signature on the painting must be read as that ofFerdinandus West, who was active in The Hague between 1637 and 1683. See Erna Kok, “Zondervrienden geen carrière: De succesvolle loopbanen van de zeventiende-eeuwse kunstenaars Govert Flinck
en Ferdinandus Bol,” De Zeventiende Eeuw 27 (2011): 310–11.
3. He would be followed by Samuel van Hoogstraten (1627–78), Jacobus Levecq (1634–75), Nicolaes
Maes (1634–93), and Arent de Gelder (1645–1727), all from Dordrecht, and perhaps also by Abraham
van Dijck (1635/36–80).
4. Otto Benesch, The Drawings of Rembrandt, ed. Eva Benesch (London, 1973), 2: 106–7, no. 448.
5. Portrait of Anna Maria von Schurman, 1642 (Baltimore Museum of Art), and Portrait of an ElderlyWoman, 1642 (Staatliche Museen, Gemäldegalerie, Berlin); Albert Blankert, Ferdinand Bol(1616–1680): Rembrandt’s Pupil (Doornspijk, 1982), 136–37, no. 117; 138, no. 121.
6. Albert Blankert, Ferdinand Bol (1616–1680): Rembrandt’s Pupil (Doornspijk, 1982), 2, 57–58.
7. Portrait of Elisabeth Jacobsdr Bas (1571–1649), ca. 1641 (Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam). Werner
Sumowski, Gemälde der Rembrandt-Schüler, vol. 5, Nachträge, Ortsregister, Ikonographisches Register,Bibliographie (Landau, 1994), 3084–85, no. 2016. However, Blankert does not support the attribution toBol and thus includes the portrait in his catalogue of rejected works. Albert Blankert, Ferdinand Bol(1616–1680): Rembrandt’s Pupil (Doornspijk, 1982), 13, 57, 184, no. R200.
8. Albert Blankert, Ferdinand Bol (1616–1680): Rembrandt’s Pupil (Doornspijk, 1982), 58, 118–21, nos.
60–65.
9. Four Regents of the Lepers’ Asylum, signed and dated 1649 (Amsterdam Museum). AlbertBlankert, Ferdinand Bol (1616–1680): Rembrandt’s Pupil (Doornspijk, 1982), 20, 59, 61, 67, 68, 155,no. 177; Werner Sumowski, Gemälde der Rembrandt-Schüler, vol. 1, J. A. Backer – A. van Dijck(Landau, 1983), 315, no. 179.
10. Bol purchased “poorterrecht” or citizenship, in 1652, which allowed him to live and conduct trade in thecity, and to join the guild.
11. Officers of the Gouda Militia under Colonel Govert Suijs, signed and dated 1653 (Museum Gouda).
Albert Blankert, Ferdinand Bol (1616–1680): Rembrandt’s Pupil (Doornspijk, 1982), 20, 68, 156, no.
178; Werner Sumowski, Gemälde der Rembrandt-Schüler, vol. 1, J. A. Backer – A. van Dijck (Landau,1983), 315, no. 180.
12. Bol’s mother-in-law was the sister of Elbert Spiegel (1600–1674), receiver-general of the Admiralty of© 2024 The Leiden Collection

Ferdinand BolPage 5 of 6Amsterdam, married to Elisabeth de Vlaming van Oudshoorn (1600–1669), whose father, Cornelis deVlaming van Oudshoorn, served as burgomaster nine times between 1656 and 1680. Bol portrayed thecouple in 1660 (Museum Briner und Kern, Winterthur). Cornelia had another brother, Hendrick Spiegel,a merchant and a council member between 1655 and 1665, who was elected burgomaster four times.
For the Spiegel family’s artistic patronage, see Rudolf E.O. Ekkart, “A Portrait Historié with Venus andCupid: Ferdinand Bol and the Patronage of the Spiegel Family,” Simiolus 29 (2002): 14–41.
13. Bol worked for the Women’s House of Correction (ca. 1655), the Wine Merchants’ Guild (1659), theLepers’ Asylum (1661), the Admiralty of Amsterdam (1661–63), and the Zuiderkerk (1669). For asurvey, see Albert Blankert, Kunst als regeringszaak in Amsterdam in de 17e eeuw: Rondom schilderijen
van Ferdinand Bol (Amsterdam, 1975); Albert Blankert, Ferdinand Bol (1616–1680): Rembrandt’sPupil (Doornspijk, 1982), 48–55. For Bol’s commissions for the Amsterdam town hall, see AlbertBlankert, Kunst als regeringszaak in Amsterdam in de 17e eeuw: Rondom schilderijen van FerdinandBol (Amsterdam, 1975), 11–36; Albert Blankert, Ferdinand Bol (1616–1680): Rembrandt’sPupil (Doornspijk, 1982), 108–18.
14. See, for example, Nina Geerdink, “De man van het beeld aan het woord: Jan Vos’ ‘Zeege derSchilderkunst’ (1654),” Nieuw Letterkundig Magazijn 28 (2010): 45–50.
15. Albert Blankert, Ferdinand Bol (1616–1680): Rembrandt’s Pupil (Doornspijk, 1982), 73. He appraised
the paintings owned by Johannes Verspreet in Amsterdam on 13 December 1656. Together with the art
dealer Gerrit Uylenburgh, he appraised the paintings of François Gysels and Laurens Mauritsz Douci on
16 July 1666 and 18 January 1669, respectively. Albert Blankert, Ferdinand Bol (1616–1680):
Rembrandt’s Pupil (Doornspijk, 1982), 76.
16. Margriet van Eikema Hommes, Art and Allegiance in the Dutch Golden Age: The Ambitions of a Wealthy
Widow in a Painted Chamber by Ferdinand Bol (Amsterdam, 2012).
17. The painting is now known only from photographs. It was lost in the fire at the Leiden town hall in
1929. Marike Hoogduin-Berkhout, “‘Op de geluckige regeeringe van Leiden’: Geschilderdevoorstellingen in het Leidse stadhuis 1575–1700,” De Zeventiende Eeuw 22 (2006): 87–92; AlbertBlankert, Ferdinand Bol (1616–1680): Rembrandt’s Pupil (Doornspijk, 1982), 21, 50, 75, no. 44.
18. Couple in a Landscape, ca. 1648 (Dordrechts Museum). See the entry Rebecca and Eliezer at the Well,fig. 3, in this catalogue; Albert Blankert, Ferdinand Bol (1616–1680): Rembrandt’s Pupil (Doornspijk,1982), 23, 151, no. 167; Werner Sumowski, Gemälde der Rembrandt-Schüler, vol. 1, J. A. Backer – A.
van Dijck (Landau, 1983), 208, no. 150. It is virtually certain that this portrait corresponds with thedescription of “des Overledens en desselfs eerste man contrefeytsel verthonende Isacq en Rebecca ineen ebbe lijst door Ferd. Bol” (the likeness of the deceased and her first husband in the guise of Isaacand Rebecca in an ebony frame by Ferd. Bol) in the estate inventory of Anna van Erckel (1681). AlbertBlankert, Ferdinand Bol (1616–1680): Rembrandt’s Pupil (Doornspijk, 1982), 84–85.
19. For a transcript of the marriage settlement, including all of the paintings, see Albert Blankert, Ferdinand
Bol (1616–1680): Rembrandt’s Pupil (Doornspijk, 1982), 76–78.
© 2024 The Leiden CollectionPowered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

Ferdinand Bol
Page 6 of 6

20. Bol received this commission from the Admiralty of Amsterdam on the occasion of De Ruyter’s victory
over the English in the Four Days’ Battle in 1666. The portrait of De Ruyter was intended for thechambers of the admiralties in Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Middelburg, Harlingen, Enkhuizen, and Hoorn,and so six copies of this “state portrait” were made. At present, copies can be found in theScheepvaartmuseum in Amsterdam, the Mauritshuis in The Hague, and the Westfries Museum inHoorn. Subsequently, Bol (his workshop) received orders for a few more versions of the “state portrait.”
Albert Blankert, Ferdinand Bol (1616–1680): Rembrandt’s Pupil (Doornspijk, 1982), 23, 63, 123–28,nos. 76–87, pls. 84–95; Werner Sumowski, Gemälde der Rembrandt-Schüler, vol. 1, J. A. Backer – A.
van Dijck (Landau, 1983), 314, no. 177.
21. Pieter van Anraedt (before 1640–78), Six Regents and the Warden of the Old Peoples’ Hospital inAmsterdam, signed and dated 1675 (Amsterdam Museum). Ferdinand Bol is seated at the far left.

Literature
Blankert, Albert. Ferdinand Bol (1616–1680): Rembrandt’s Pupil. Doornspijk, 1982.
Sumowski, Werner. Gemälde der Rembrandt-Schüler. Vol. 1, J. A. Backer – A. van Dijck. Landau, 1983.
Sumowski, Werner. Gemälde der Rembrandt-Schüler. Vol. 5, Nachträge, Ortsregister, IkonographischesRegister, Bibliographie. Landau, 1994.
Sumowski, Werner. Gemälde der Rembrandt-Schüler. Vol. 6, Nachträge 2, Ortsregister, IkonographischesRegister, Bibliographie, Künstlerverzeichnis. Landau, 1994.
Hoogduin-Berkhout, Marike. “‘Op de geluckige regeeringe van Leiden’: Geschilderde voorstellingen inhet Leidse stadhuis 1575–1700.” De Zeventiende Eeuw 22 (2006): 87–92.
Geerdink, Nina. “De man van het beeld aan het woord. Jan Vos’ ‘Zeege der Schilderkunst’ 1654.” Nieuw
Letterkundig Magazijn 28 (2010): 45–50.
Dickey, Stephanie S., ed. Ferdinand Bol and Govert Flinck: New Research. Zwolle, 2017.
Middelkoop, Norbert, ed. Ferdinand Bol and Govert Flinck: Rembrandt’s Master Pupils. Exh. cat.
Amsterdam, Amsterdam Museum. Zwolle, 2017.
Te Slaa, Willem, Tonko Grever, and Quirine van Aerts. Ferdinand Bol: Het huis, de collectie, dekunstenaar. Exh. cat. Amsterdam, Museum Van Loon. Zwolle, 2017.

© 2024 The Leiden Collection