Willem van de Velde I. Willem van de Velde the Elder was a Dutch Golden Age seascape painter.
Willem van de Velde, known as the Elder, a marine draughtsman and painter, was born in Leiden, the son of a Flemish skipper, Willem Willemsz. van de Velde, and is commonly said to have been bred to the sea.
In 1706 Bainbrigg Buckeridge noted that he understood navigation very well. He married Judith Adriaensdochter van Leeuwen in Leiden, the Netherlands, in 1631.
His three known legitimate children were named Magdalena, born 1632; Willem, known as the Younger, also a marine painter, born 1633; and Adriaen, a landscape painter, born 1636. His marriage was stormy, at least in its later years.
David Cordingly relates that Willem the Elder fathered two children out of wedlock in 1653, one by his maidservant, and the other by her friend. Nine years later the Elder and his wife went through a legal separation, on account of legal disputes and the most violent quarrels. The immediate cause of the dispute was his affair with a married woman. Michael S. Robinson noted that on 17/27 July 1662, he and his wife agreed to part. A condition of the separation was that the Elder could recover from his son Adriaen two royal gifts, presumably gifts from Charles II for work done in England. Cordingly's account further relates that the dispute was still continuing after another ten years, since in the autumn of 1672 Judith comp
Willem van de Velde, known as the Elder, a marine draughtsman and painter, was born in Leiden, the son of a Flemish skipper, Willem Willemsz. van de Velde, and is commonly said to have been bred to the sea.
In 1706 Bainbrigg Buckeridge noted that he understood navigation very well. He married Judith Adriaensdochter van Leeuwen in Leiden, the Netherlands, in 1631.
His three known legitimate children were named Magdalena, born 1632; Willem, known as the Younger, also a marine painter, born 1633; and Adriaen, a landscape painter, born 1636. His marriage was stormy, at least in its later years.
David Cordingly relates that Willem the Elder fathered two children out of wedlock in 1653, one by his maidservant, and the other by her friend. Nine years later the Elder and his wife went through a legal separation, on account of legal disputes and the most violent quarrels. The immediate cause of the dispute was his affair with a married woman. Michael S. Robinson noted that on 17/27 July 1662, he and his wife agreed to part. A condition of the separation was that the Elder could recover from his son Adriaen two royal gifts, presumably gifts from Charles II for work done in England. Cordingly's account further relates that the dispute was still continuing after another ten years, since in the autumn of 1672 Judith comp
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