Godefridus Schalcken(Made 1643 – 1706 The Hague)

How To CiteBakker, Piet. "Godefridus Schalcken." In The Leiden Collection Catalogue. Edited by Arthur K. Wheelock
Jr. New York, 2017.
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Godefridus (also called Godfried) Schalcken was born in Made near Geertruidenberg in 1643 to theclergyman Cornelis Schalcken and Aletta Lydius, who came from a respected family of preachers andtheologians.[1] When Cornelis was made rector of the Latin school in Dordrecht, he and his family moved tothat city in 1654.[2] There, in 1656, the thirteen-year-old Godefridus was apprenticed to his fellow townsman
Samuel van Hoogstraten (1627–78), after which he went to study under Gerrit Dou (1613–75) in Leiden
around 1663.[3] Exactly when Schalcken returned to Dordrecht is unknown, it was presumably shortly after
he completed his training. In any case, he was living in Dordrecht again around 1669.[4]In October 1679 Schalcken married Francoisia van Diemen from Breda, the daughter of Christoffel vanDiemen, an officer in the State army, and Elisabeth Beens, who came from a prominent Breda
family.[5] Schalcken and his wife had seven children, of whom only their daughter Francoisia (b. 1690)
reached adulthood. She married twice; the first time in 1713 to the Hague architect Pieter Roman(1676–after 1733).[6]Together with Eglon van der Neer (1635/36–1703) and Caspar Netscher (1639–84), Schalcken was among
the most important representatives of a third generation of fijnschilders (fine painters) after Dou and Frans
van Mieris (1635–81). Schalcken was the first fijnschilder from outside of Leiden, although naturally he wasintroduced to fijnschilderkunst (a fine and meticulous manner of painting) there.[7] According to Houbraken,
he was influenced primarily by Dou, “whose facture he was able to emulate almost perfectly.”[8] As anexample, he mentions Schalcken’s Vrouwtje komt ten Hoof (“Game of Lady Come into the Garden”), whichenjoyed a certain renown in Dordrecht in the 1670s.[9] Still, this early work already demonstrates that Dou’s
influence remained limited to his technique and that Schalcken assimilated Van Mieris’s style, as did Van
der Neer and Netscher.[10]Schalcken and the other fijnschilders, however, soon took a new tack. Responding to the shifting and moreinternationally oriented tastes of the upper class who were becoming tired of traditional subjects, Schalcken
became increasingly captivated by the classicism emanating from France, which had begun to leave its
mark on Dutch painting in the 1660s.[11] Schalcken expressed his striving for a classical ideal of beauty not
only in the rendering of figures and their refined, “aristocratic” lifestyle, but also in experimenting with more
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elevated scenes from the Bible and classical antiquity.[12]Though Schalcken’s history paintings were satisfying, his reputation at home and far beyond theboundaries of the Dutch Republic rested on his kaarslichtjes, or pictures with figures in a nocturnal setting
illuminated by artificial light. The artist’s rendering of artificial light was unsurpassed and this talent stoodhim in good stead when painting portraits: the diffuse candlelight allowed for a soft modeling of the face,giving the sitter an amiable and elegant impression. Two notable examples are his portrait of StadholderKing William III by candlelight,[13] and his nocturnal self-portrait, which he sent around 1695 to Cosimo III
de’ Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany, in response to the latter’s request for a painting by the artist.[14]Schalcken achieved great renown with his portraits. Portraiture did not lend itself well to the timeconsuming “fine painting,” and thus “from time to time he turned to a more pleasing and airier manner ofpainting.[15] After Nicolaes Maes (1634–93) moved to Amsterdam in 1673, Schalcken became Dordrecht’s
leading portrait painter, and his reputation soon extended well beyond that city. In 1676 he painted portraitsof the wealthy Leiden cloth merchant Pieter de la Court and four members of his family.[16] As of the 1680s
Schalcken traveled regularly to The Hague to work on the many lucrative portrait commissions he received
from the distinguished circles around first Stadholder and then, as of 1689, King William III (1650–1702).
The artist’s Hague interests led him to join the local painters’ society Pictura in 1691, although he continued
to reside in Dordrecht.
Together with his family Schalcken crossed the North Sea around 1692 and established himself in London.
According to Houbraken, he met with great success there and the English elite was eager to sit for him.
Weyerman, who had little liking for Schalcken’s work, perceived his London years in an entirely different
light.[17] He maliciously informed his readers that the English soon had had enough of Schalcken’s portraits,
which were “as flat as unrisen pancakes,” lacking “the firm, round, loose, and powerful manner that[viewers] discerned in the delightful likenesses by the Knight [Godfried] Kneller […] and many others in that
century of blossoming portraitists.” As a consequence, Schalcken was forced “to paint history scenes and‘night lights’ [nocturnal scenes].”[18] Whether Schalcken actually had such a dearth of patrons in London isunknown, but it is true that very few portraits by Schalcken can be linked to his London years.
The artist was back in the Dutch Republic in June 1698 and settled in The Hague to build further on thesuccess he had enjoyed there prior to his departure. Particularly notable was his intensive contact withElector Palatine Johann Wilhelm, an aficionado of Dutch painting who, together with the Danish kingFrederick IV (1671–1730) and the Prussian king Frederick I (1657–1713), was one of the artist’s mostimportant patrons in the final phase of his life. The contact with the Elector even led to a brief sojourn in
Düsseldorf in 1703. During this visit Johann Wilhelm presented Schalcken with a gold chain in gratitude forhis service, which he depicted in his self-portrait of 1706.[19] This was to be his last self-portrait; Schalcken
died in The Hague on 13 November of that same year.

-Piet Bakker© 2017 The Leiden Collection

Godefridus Schalcken
Page 3 of 6Endnotes
1. For the biographies of various celebrated members of the Lydius family, see: A.J. van der Aa,
Biographisch Woordenboek der Nederlanden, vol. 11 (Haarlem, 1865), 775–91.
2. His father was initially a parish minister in Eethen and Drongelen (west of Den Bosch), and inDrimmelen and Made from 1643 to 1654.
3. Houbraken’s assertion that Schalcken completed his training with Dou is confirmed by an
inscription on a contemporary portrait print of Schalcken: “Ger. Dow, Pictor Lugd. Batav. Honoris
ergo Praeceptorem suum delineavit G. Schalcken.” Alfred von Wurzbach, NiederländischesKünstler Lexikon, vol. 2, (Leipzig, 1911), 568. The text of the inscription is from: Annegret Laabs,
De Leidse Fijnschilders uit Dresden (Exh. cat. Dresden, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister, StaatlicheKunstsammlungen; Leiden, Stedelijke Museum De Lakenhal) (Zwolle, 2001), 111 n. 238.
4. On 30 September 1672, Godefridus Schalcken, together with several other members of hiscivic guard, made a statement regarding an unfortunate fellow militiaman who had accidentally
shot two people. Those who made the statement are described as “hebbende nu enige jaren
herwaerts gewoont en gewaeckt [hebbende] onder het vaendel van de Nieuwstraet (having now
lived there several years and guarded [having been part of the militia company] under the bannerof Nieuwstraat). Exactly how long ago this was depends on one’s interpretation of “enige”(several). The year 1669 as the earliest evidence of Schalcken’s presence in Dordrecht seems
entirely plausible, certainly because he had presumably been living in Dordrecht for quite sometime. In any case, documentation concerning a stay in Leiden in the 1660s has yet to be found.
5. For the Beens family, see: G. van Niekerken, “Het geslacht Beens te Breda,” De
Nederlandsche Leeuw 98 (1981): cols. 387–405.
6. For Pieter Roman, see: Ulrich Thieme and Felix Becker,Algemeines Lexikon der Bildenden
Künstler, vol. 28 (Leipzig, 1934), 543.

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7. Peter Hecht, De Hollandse fijnschilders: Van Gerard Dou tot Adriaen van der Werff (Exh. cat.
Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum) (Maarsen/The Hague, 1989), 16. That this relationship between
these consecutive generations was also perceived by contemporaries is tellingly illustrated in astatement given in Dordrecht in 1676 incriminating the painter Theodorus Hartkamp (1635–89),
who “met verachtelycke expressiën en cleyne estime soude gesproken hebben van deschilderconste van Srs. Douw, Mieres en Schalcken” (allegedly spoke of the painting of Messrs.
Dou, Mieris, and Schalcken with disdain and low regard). His contempt, presumably stemmingfrom professional rivalry, was reserved specifically for Schalcken. When Hartkamp refuted theaccusation, he admitted that he could no longer remember his derogatory remarks about Dou
and Van Mieris, “maer sooveel de schilderkonste van Sr. Schalcken was aengaende” (but asregards the painting of Mr. Schalcken) it is certain “dat [Hartkamp] in geselschap heeft geseyt;
Foutre Schalcke schilderkonst, Foutre het stuckje bij denselven Schalcke van ‘vrouwken comtten Hove’ gemaeckt, en veele diergelijcke verachtende woorden meer” (that [Hartkamp] said in
public: fuck Schalcken’s paintings, fuck the painting by this same Schalcken of “Game of Lady
Come into the Garden” and many more equally scornful words). A. Bredius, “Onbekendeschilders, o.a. Casparus Smits zich ook genoemd hebbende Theodorus Hartkamp,” OudHolland 33 (1915): 116–17. Compare P. Hecht, De Hollandse fijnschilders: Van Gerard Dou tot
Adriaen van der Werff (Exh. cat. Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum) (Maarsen/The Hague, 1989),
182–85 (cat. no. 37).
8. “Welker behandeling hy vry wel heeft weten na te bootsen.” Arnold Houbraken,De grooteschouburgh der Nederlantsche konstschilders en schilderressen , 3 vols. (2nd ed., The Hague,1753; reprint Amsterdam, 1976), 3:175.
9. Arnold Houbraken, De groote schouburgh der Nederlantsche konstschilders enschilderressen, 3 vols. (2nd ed., The Hague, 1753; reprint Amsterdam, 1976), 3:175–76. This is
Vrouwtje kom ten Hoof (“Game of Lady Come into the Garden”), oil on panel, 63.5 x 49.5 cm,Buckingham Palace, London, H.M. Queen Elizabeth II. The painting is specifically mentioned in
the quotation in note 8.
10. A telling example of Van Mieris’s influence on painters such as Schalcken, Van der Neer,and Netscher is found in their various scenes of women making music, which all rely on aprototype by Frans van Mieris: Lute Player of 1663, illustrated in Otto Naumann, Frans vanMieris (1635–1681) the Elder, XX vols. (Doornspijk, 1981), vol. 2, pl. 52. Works with this motif byJohannes Vermeer (1632–75) and Jan Steen (1626–79) also appear to be variations on Van
Mieris’s composition. John Loughmanh et al., “Godfried Schalcken,” in De Zichtbare Werelt:
Schilderkunst uit de Gouden Eeuw in Hollands oudste stad (Exh. cat. Dordrecht, DordrechtsMuseum) (Zwolle, 1992), 268–69 (cat. no. 73).

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11. Peter Hecht, De Hollandse fijnschilders: Van Gerard Dou tot Adriaen van der Werff (Exh.
cat. Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum) (Maarsen/The Hague, 1989), 13–19. Ekkehard Mai, “De
Nederlandse historieschilderkunst omstreeks 1700. Traditie, bloei en ‘verval’,” in Ekkehard Mai
et al., De Kroon op het werk: Hollandse schilderkunst 1670–1750 (Exh. cat. Cologne, WallrafRichartz-Museum; Dordrecht, Dordrechts Museum; Kassel, Museumlandschaft Hessen Kassel)(Zwolle, 2000), 29–48. For a survey of Classicism in North Netherlandish history painting, see:
Albert Blankert et. al., Dutch Classicism in seventeenth-century painting (Exh. cat. Rotterdam,
Museum Boymans Van Beuningen; Frankfurt am Main, Städelsches Kunstinstitut) (Rotterdam,1999), 12–33.
12. G. Weber, “Een steile klim. Enkele aspecten van de ‘veradelijking’ van de schilderkunst rond
1700,” in Ekkehard Mai et al., De Kroon op het werk: Hollandse schilderkunst 1670–1750 (Exh.
cat.

Cologne,Wallraf-Richartz-Museum;

Dordrecht,DordrechtsMuseum;

Kassel,Museumlandschaft Hessen Kassel) (Zwolle, 2000), 51–60. See also: Junko Aono, “Ennobling
Daily Life: A Question of Refinement in Early Eighteenth-Century Dutch Genre Painting,”
Simiolus 33 (2008): 237–57.
13. Oil on canvas, 76.5 x 65 cm, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam (HdG 331).
14. Oil on canvas, 92.3 x 61 cm, signed and dated 1695, Uffizi, Florence (HdG 281).
15. “Geraakte hy van tyd tot tyt tot een aangenamer en luchtvaardiger wyze van schilderen.”Arnold Houbraken, De groote schouburgh der Nederlantsche konstschilders en schilderressen ,3 vols. (2nd ed., The Hague, 1753; reprint Amsterdam, 1976), 3:138.
16. Peter Hecht, De Hollandse fijnschilders: Van Gerard Dou tot Adriaen van der Werff (Exh.
cat. Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum) (Maarsen/The Hague, 1989), 186–89 (cat. no. 38).
17. Peter Hecht, “Candlelight and Dirty Fingers, or Royal Virtue in Disguise: Some Thoughts on
Weyerman and Godfried Schalcken.” Simiolus 11 (1980): 23–38.
18. “Zo plat als ongereeze pannekoeken” / “die vaste, ronde, losse en krachtige manier niet
[konden] zien, die zij zaagen op de heerlijke konterfeijtsels van den Ridder [Godfried] Kneller […]en meer andere in die eeuw bloeiende Konterfijters” / “begeeven tot het schilderen vanhistoriestukjes en nachtlichtjes.” J. C. Weyerman, De levens-beschryvingen der Nederlantsche
konstschilders en konstschilderessen, 4 vols. (The Hague, 1729), 3:13. Compare Peter Hecht,“Candlelight and Dirty Fingers, or Royal Virtue in Disguise: Some Thoughts on Weyerman andGodfried Schalcken.” Simiolus 11 (1980): 25 (n. 11).

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19. Ekkehard Mai et al., De Kroon op het werk: Hollandse schilderkunst 1670–1750 (Exh. cat.
Cologne, Wallraf-Richartz-Museum; Dordrecht, Dordrechts Museum; Kassel, Museumlandschaft
Hessen Kassel) (Zwolle, 2000), 264. For Schalcken’s relationship with Elector Palatine Johann
Wilhelm, see: B. Roland, “Das letzte Selbstbildnis von Godfried Schalcken,” Die Welkunst 33,no. 3 (1963): 10–11. For his sojourn in Düsseldorf, see: P. Schaarschmidt,Zur Geschichte derDüsseldorfer Kunst (Düsseldorf, 1902), 15.

Literature
Houbraken, Arnold. De groote schouburgh der Nederlantsche konstschilders en
schilderressen. 3 vols. 2nd ed. The Hague, 1753; reprint, Amsterdam, 1976, 3:175–79.
Weyerman, J. C. De levens-beschryvingen der Nederlantsche konstschilders en
konstschilderessen. 4 vols. The Hague, 1729, 3:11–16.
Veth, G.H. “Godfried Schalcken.” In F.D.O. Obreen, Archief voor de Nederlandsche
Kunstgeschiedenis. Vol. 6. Rotterdam, 1884–87, 1–2.
Veth, G. H. “Aantekeningen omtrent eenige Dordrechtse schilders: Godefridus Schalcken.”
Oud-Holland 10 (1892): 1–11.
Hecht, Peter. “Candlelight and Dirty Fingers, or Royal Virtue in Disguise: Some Thoughts on
Weyerman and Godfried Schalcken.” Simiolus 11 (1980): 23–38.
Beherman, Thierry. Godfried Schalcken. Paris, 1988.
Hecht, Pieter. De Hollandse fijnschilders: Van Gerard Dou tot Adriaen van der Werff. Exh.
cat. Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum. Maarsen. The Hague, 1989, 13–19, 165–96.
Loughman, John et al. “Godfried Schalcken.” In De Zichtbare Werelt: Schilderkunst uit deGouden Eeuw in Hollands oudste stad. Exh. cat. Dordrecht, Dordrechts Museum. Zwolle,1992, 263–73.
Jansen, Guido. “Godfried Schalcken.” In J. Turner, Dictionary of Art, 28. London, 1996,49–50.
Mai, Ekkehard et al. De Kroon op het werk: Hollandse schilderkunst 1670–1750. Exh. cat.
Cologne,Wallraf-Richartz-Museum;

Dordrecht,DordrechtsMuseum;

Kassel,Museumlandschaft Hessen Kassel. Zwolle, 2000.

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