Alexander Adriaenssen (Antwerp 1587-1661)

The son of the composer Emanuel Adriaenssen and brother of the artists Vincent and Nicolaes Adriaenssen, Alexander was apprenticed in 1597 to Artus van Laeck, becoming a master in the Antwerp painters' guild in 1610. His oeuvre consists entirely of still lifes, with known dated works from 1623-1661. Adriaenssen's pictures were much admired by his contemporaries and two were recorded in the posthumous inventory of Rubens, whose wife Isabella Brandt was godmother to one of his children.