Collection: Peter Paul Rubens

Sir Peter Paul Rubens (28 June 1577 – 30 May 1640) was a Flemish artist and diplomat. He is considered the most influential artist of the Flemish Baroque tradition. Rubens's highly charged compositions reference erudite aspects of classical and Christian history. His unique and immensely popular Baroque style emphasised movement, colour, and sensuality, which followed the immediate, dramatic artistic style promoted in the Counter-Reformation. Rubens was a painter producing altarpieces, portraits, landscapes, and history paintings of mythological and allegorical subjects.

He was also a prolific designer of cartoons for the Flemish tapestry workshops and of frontispieces for the publishers in Antwerp. Rubens was born and raised in the Holy Roman Empire (modern-day Germany) to parents who were refugees from Antwerp in the Duchy of Brabant in the Spanish Netherlands and moved to Antwerp at about 12.

In addition to running a large workshop in Antwerp that produced paintings popular with nobility and art collectors throughout Europe, Rubens was a classically educated humanist scholar and diplomat who was knighted by both Philip IV of Spain and Charles I of England. Rubens was a prolific artist. The catalogue of his works by Michael Jaffé lists 1,403 pieces, excluding numerous copies made in his workshop. His commissioned works were mostly history paintings, which included religious and mythological subjects, and hunt scenes.

He studied under Tobias Verhaecht, Otto van Veen, and Adam van Noort. His style took its cues from Paolo Veronese and Pieter Brueghel the Elder. Among his canonical works are Henry IV at the Battle of Ivry, 14 March 1590, Portrait of Susanna Lunden, The Elevation of the Cross, and The Three Graces. He worked primarily in religious art, animal art, and mythological painting. His work is rooted in Flemish Baroque painting.