Van Hemessen & Father

Van Hemessen & Father brings a forgotten family of artistic pioneers back into the spotlight, thereby rewriting the story of the Antwerp Renaissance from a surprising perspective: that of a painter’s studio where father and children worked together, experimented, and left their mark on art history. The book serves as the catalogue for the exhibition of the same name at the Snijders&Rockoxhuis in Antwerp, which, in a modified form, will have a second venue at the National Gallery in London. The focus is on daughter Catharina van Hemessen, the earliest Southern Netherlandish Renaissance painter of whom signed works have survived. She painted as a woman in a man’s world, signed her work with self-assurance and garnered international admiration from art connoisseurs even in her own time. Her work bears witness to artistic finesse and intellectual independence. Her father, Jan Sanders van Hemessen, is regarded as a key figure in the artistic transition from Quinten Massijs to Pieter Bruegel the Elder, with an artistic output that hovered somewhere between medieval mysticism and humanist realism. In the bustling Antwerp of the 16th century, he developed into an influential master with a thriving studio.

Dr Maarten Bassens is curator in chief of the Museum Snijders&Rockoxhuis in Antwerp and the KBC Art Collection in Brussels. As an art historical scholar specialising in 16th century print and drawing culture, his curatorial work focuses also on early modern painting and tapestry in Antwerp. He is co-author of Bruegel: The Complete Graphic Works (Thames & Hudson, 2019) and has previously held positions at institutions including the Royal Library of Belgium (KBR) and The Courtauld, London.