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Jan van der Heyden
Dutch, 1637 - 1712
Dutch painter, draughtsman, printmaker and inventor. In 1650 he moved to Amsterdam with his family; his father, a Mennonite, who had pursued various occupations rather unsuccessfully, died that year. Jan’s artistic training may have begun with drawing lessons in the studio of a relative, perhaps his eldest brother, Goris van der Heyden, who made and sold mirrors; Jan may also have studied the reverse technique of glass painting with an artist in Gorinchem. Painting occupied relatively little of his time, however, although he continued to pursue it throughout his long life. His prosperity was mainly due to his work as an inventor, engineer and municipal official. He designed and implemented a comprehensive street-lighting scheme for Amsterdam, which lasted from 1669 until 1840 and was adopted as a model by many other towns in the Netherlands and abroad. In 1672, with his brother Nicolaes van der Heyden, he invented a fire engine fitted with pump-driven hoses, which transformed the efficiency of fire-fighting.
Jan van der Heyden: The Huis ten Bosch Seen from…As an artist, van der Heyden is best known as one of the first Dutch painters to specialize in the Townscape; architectural motifs certainly dominate his compositions, though he also painted village streets, country houses (e.g. The Huis ten Bosch Seen from the Back, c. 1668–70; New York, Met.) and some forty landscapes, at least two of which are painted on glass (e.g. View of the Woods; Amsterdam, Rijksmus.). His later works are mainly still-lifes (e.g. Corner of a Room with Rarities on Display; Budapest, Mus. F.A.). Unlike the Haarlem-based brothers Job and Gerrit Berckheyde, whose townscapes were influenced by traditions of genre, bambocciate and architectural painting, van der Heyden’s approach was closer to ‘pure’ landscape. His main subjects were Amsterdam and the region near the Dutch–German border, which he visited for business and recreation. A group of 14 paintings is connected with the village of Maarssen, some probably made for Joan Huydecoper II, the Amsterdam burgomaster who developed real estate around that village. In 1674 he commissioned van der Heyden to execute paintings of his house and estate at Goudstein (version, London, Apsley House).
Van der Heyden’s townscapes are only loosely based on actual views, topographical accuracy being the least of his concerns. He seems to have attempted instead to distil into a single concentrated image the distinctive character of a town, in such a way that the experience of visiting it would be enhanced. A notable exception is his architectural ‘portrait’ of the Westerkerk, Amsterdam (London, Wallace). All other townscapes show the buildings only partially depicted, with much attention paid to surrounding structures and open spaces. He delighted in picturesque contrasts between modern (mostly imaginary) buildings and historical settings, between buildings and trees, as in Architectural Fantasy with the Old Stadhuis, Amsterdam (c. 1667–72; London, Apsley House) and between large structures and open spaces, as in View of the Heerengracht, Amsterdam (Paris, Louvre) and View of the Huis ten Bosch (London, N.G.; for illustration of the latter see Post, (1)). Despite his naturalistic style, these are all idealized views, deliberately lacking up-to-date items from the real world, such as the street lamps and fire engines he himself invented. It is impossible, moreover, to distinguish between townscapes with identifiable elements and those that are completely imaginary.
The great clarity of incidental detail in van der Heyden’s paintings, such as the rendering of brickwork, is impressive and must have been achieved with the aid of a magnifying glass. Yet it is so skilfully handled that it does not distract attention from the impact of the whole scene. He may have made use also of a camera obscura, lenses and mirrors, but this is unlikely since he was rarely recording actual views. Only one preparatory drawing connected with a painting is known. Adriaen van de Velde and Johannes Lingelbach sometimes provided the figures in his painted works.
In the drawings van der Heyden made as designs for etchings, all of which advertise his inventions, he took unusual care, as is clear from surviving preliminary studies (e.g. Amsterdam, Rijksmus.) for illustrations to his book on the new fire engine, Beschryving der nieuwlyks uitgevonden en geoctrojeerde slang-brand-spuiten en hare wyze van brand-blussen (‘Description of the newly discovered and patented hose fire engine and her way of putting out fires’; Amsterdam, 1690). His first sketches are rather awkward; each subsequent step in the creative process added detail, refinement and quality, which he seems to have conquered painstakingly, without any trace of spontaneity or virtuosity. He made extensive use of counterproofs of his drawings so that the images, once transferred to the etching plate, would be depicted correctly in the final print. For instance, after working up his original drawing of a burnt-out house with brush and wash to establish the light and shade effects, he introduced small figures separately on to a counterproof. The final prints also provide rare historical documentation of poor and industrial areas of Amsterdam not seen in townscapes of the period. In the production of these and other publications, van der Heyden collaborated with other artists, including the printmaker Jan van Vianen (1660–after 1726) and his own son Jan van der Heyden the younger. Van Vianen, for example, drew the figures in van der Heyden’s largest print (1699) illustrating a technical development in fire-fighting equipment.
Van der Heyden died a wealthy man, with over 70 paintings in his possession. Although no pupils or immediate followers are recorded for him, he was an important influence on the development of townscape painting in the mid-18th century.
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