Otto Van Veen

A distinguished and scholarly artist, Van Veen is best known as a teacher of Rubens, who studied with him from 1596 to 1598 and then assisted him for another two years before leaving for Italy. Van Veen's career bears some similarity to that of his most famous pupil. Born into an aristocratic family, he studied in the Netherlands and Italy and spent most of his career in Antwerp, where he had a large studio. Like Rubens, he found great success as a court painter and worked for, among others, Rudolf II in Prague, William V in Bavaria, and Alessandro Farnese in Brussels.