David Teniers

Flemish, 1582–1649

BiographyDavid Teniers the Younger was baptized in Antwerp on 15 December 1610. He learned the art of painting from his father, an art dealer and painter of small-scale history paintings. The younger Teniers became a master in the Antwerp guild in 1632/33, and was elected dean in 1645/6. In 1637 he married Anna Brueghel, daughter of the Flemish painter Jan Brueghel the Elder (1568-1625). Teniers received his first commission from Archduke Leopold Wilhelm, governor of the Netherlands, in 1647; four years later he was appointed court painter and director of the Archduke's painting collection. Teniers worked for the Archduke and his successor until 1659.

Together with his mentor Adriaen Brouwer (1605/6-1638), Teniers was the most important seventeenth-century Flemish painter of low-life genre scenes. He also painted historical, mythological, and allegorical subjects, as well as high-life scenes and portraits. Teniers was a versatile and extremely prolific painter, and his work was highly sought after by princes and collectors across Europe.

Also known as David Teniers the Elder; father of David Teniers the Younger.