Hendrick van Steenwijk the Younger

Steenwyck the Younger, Hendrick van

Flemish, c. 1580 - 1649

Explore Selected Works

A man and woman, both with light skin, stand near a column under a pointed arch in a darkened, stone church in this vertical painting. To our right, the pair is lit only by the candle the man holds in his left hand. He stands with his back to us, and his face, almost in profile, is mostly lost in shadow. He has a pronounced bulbous, hooked nose, and his full lower lip projects past his beard. His tall cap is split down the sides, and he wears a red cloak lined with white fur. He leans toward the woman and holds her left hand in his right, closer to us. The candlelight falls on her pale, rounded face. Her blond hair is pulled up in a knot on the top of her head. Her eyes are cast down under arched brows, and she has full, pink lips. Her dress has a forest-green bodice with a flaring, starched, white, lace-edged collar and rose-pink sleeves with lace cuffs. The dress has buttons down the front of the bodice and falls open over a butter-yellow under-skirt. The window to our left, opposite the pair, is dark, and the church and vaults beyond the archway under which they stand are deeply shadowed. A dark, rectangular void seems to be carved into the tiled, stone floor near their feet, close to us. The artist signed and dated the work as if he had carved his name into the floor just beyond the void: “H.V.S. 1616.”
Hendrick van Steenwijk the Younger, Esther and Mordecai, 1616, oil on panel, Nell and Robert Weidenhammer Fund, 2006.20.1

Esther and Mordecai

Hendrick van Steenwijk the Younger · 1616 · oil on panel ·  Accession ID  2006.20.1

Bibliography

2006

  • Baudouin, Frans. "Steenwijk: (2) Hendrick van Steenwijk (ii)." Grove Art Online (accessed 11 July 2006), http://www.groveart.com/shared/views/article/html?section=art.081156.2.