page_title: Jan de Herdt
section_title: Work
hierarchical_section_title: Jan de Herdt / Work
context_page_description: Jan de Herdt, in Italy also called Il fiammingo was a Flemish painter and draughtsman. After training in Antwerp, he spent his entire career abroad, first in Northern Italy and later in Vienna and other cities in central Europe. He was mainly a portrait artist but also painted genre scenes as well as religious, mythological and allegorical subjects. He was part of a network of Flemish and Dutch painters working for the court, aristocracy and ecclesiastical institutions of central Europe.
context_section_description: Jan de Herdt was a versatile painter who painted portraits, stories from the bible, history paintings and genre scenes.  He signed the vast majority of his works with the most widespread variant of his name J. D. Herdt.  The most apparent influences on his work are Antwerp's leading painters Anthony van Dyck, Rubens, Jordaens and Caspar de Crayer.  The style of de Herdt's portraits shows the influence of the van Dyckian portrait model.  This influence is also recognisable in his series of paintings recounting stories from Torquato Tasso's 'Gerusalemme Liberata' such as the Erminia and the shepherds.
  Jan de Herdt also was aware of trends in Central European painting.  This is shown in his Portrait of the family of Imperial Goldsmith Franz Wilhelm de Harde von Antorﬀ (Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium). De Herdt's family portrait likely includes a self-portrait in the young man on the left who holds a watch in his left hand and points with his right hand to the floor.  Alternatively, this may be a portrait of his nephew. Given the similarities between the two works,de Herdt's family portrait may indicate that he had seen the Family of precious stone cutter Dionysius Miseroni (National Gallery Prague) painted by the Czech portrait painter Karel Škréta in 1653.  This was one of the first group portraits of this kind in Central Europe.  In 1669 Tobias Pock painted a Self-Portrait with the artist's family in which he depicted himself in a manner that is almost identical to the one used by Jan de Herdt in his family portrait. Pock may have known de Herdt's family portrait.  Jan de Herdt along with the above-mentioned artists created an entirely new visual language in Central Europe through this type of communicative group portrait.
  Jan de Herdt collaborated on the publication Historia di Leopoldo Cesare written by Galeazzo Gualdo Priorato and published in Vienna by the Flemish publisher from Antwerp Johann Baptist Hacque.  The first and second volumes of the book were published in 1670 and a third one in 1674. The first volume described the political and military successes of Emperor Leopold I between 1656 and 1670.  It was mainly illustrated with prints made by Flemish and Dutch printmakers after designs by other Netherlandish artists as well as artists from Germany and Italy. The illustrations mainly depict portraits of European monarchs and important aristocrats, castle scenes, battle scenes, maps and ceremonies. Apart from Jan de Herdt, the Dutch and Flemish artists who contributed to the work were Frans Geffels, Cornelis Meyssens, Franciscus van der Steen, Gerard Bouttats, Adriaen van Bloemen, Sebastian van Dryweghen and Jacob Toorenvliet.  German artists Moritz Lang, Johann Martin Lerch and Johann Holst and Italians Il Bianchi, Marco Boschini and Leonardus Hen.t Venetiis also contributed.
  Jan de Herdt contributed at least six designs for portraits: Jerzy Sebastian Lubomirski, Duke Ferdinand Dietrichstein, Count Jean-Louis Raduit de Souches, Count Raimund Montecuccoli, Count Jan Rottal and Count Nicholas Zrinsky.  The prints designed by de Herdt in this publication have been used as the basis for attributing paintings to de Herdt.  For instance, the Portrait of the Polish nobleman and commander Jerzy Sebastian Lubomirski (Royal Castle, Warsaw) was attributed in this manner.  De Herdt is also the author of a series of portraits of members of the Waldstein family.
  The works de Herdt created in Italy are all found in Lombardy. In 1920 the artist's signature was discovered on the altarpiece of the high altar of the Church of Saint Maurice in Breno in Lombardy, northern Italy.  The altarpiece depicts Saint Maurice kneeling before the Virgin and Child. There was a Portrait of St. Elizabeth (now lost) in the Church of St. Francis of Assisi in Brescia. There is an altarpiece depicting the Virgin in the clouds with Saints Anthony of Padua and Valentine, signed J. De Herdt F. in situ at the Church of San Giovanni Decollato in Desenzano del Garda. Another painting by de Herdt in Lombardy is an altarpiece of Moses striking the roc
caption: Portrait of Franz Augustin von Waldstein
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