Dirck Barendsz


Dirck Barendsz or Theodor Barendszoon was a Dutch Renaissance painter from Amsterdam who traveled to Italy in his youth to learn from the Italian masters, most notably Titian.

Biography

He was trained by his father, a painter known as Dooven Barent, or deaf Barent, and in 1555, at the age of twenty-one, Barendsz travelled to Italy. During his seven-year stay there, Karel van Mander tells us that he was "nursed at the great Titian's bosem."
He was a great friend of Philip Van Marnix, whom he met in Rome, and Dominicus Lampsonius, with whom he corresponded in Latin. He was a good musician and his most notable work, among various other pieces Van Mander describes that he painted in Amsterdam, was a Judith. Among pieces worthy of mention in Leiden that Van Mander liked was a Venus that at the time he was writing in 1604 was in the possession of Sybrandt Buyck. Van Mander further lists a Table and a Christmas piece in the possession of the Franciscans in Gouda, and a copy of a tronie by Titian, in the possession of Pieter Isaacsz, an Amsterdam painter and art dealer.
His chapel piece voor the Amsterdam militia, called a Fall of Lucifer by Mander, was destroyed in the beeldenstorm, but his militia portrait for the same group that hung in their meeting hall survived.
He died in Amsterdam.

Gallery