User:Neddyseagoon/sandbox/Hinlopen

Jan Jacobszoon Hinlopen (1626 - 1666) or Jan J. Hinlopen was a rich Dutch cloth merchant, real estate developer, city schepen and a keen art collector. His paintings are spread all over the world. Jan J. Hinlopen was a maecenas for the arts and is mentioned as an influential protector of Rembrandt. Like his father-in-law Hinlopen is known, because of the poems by Jan Vos on the paintings in his house, quite unique in art history.

Two of Metsu's finest paintings, depicting the Hinlopen family, can be seen in the Metropolitan Museum and the Gemäldegalerie. Probably Metsu placed both paintings in a large room of the city hall. It is unclear how many Gabriel Metsu paintings Jan J. Hinlopen had in his possession. He, his wife or children may have acted as models, more than once.

Life
Jan J. Hinlopen was the son of the merchant Jacob J. Hinlopen (1582-1629), dealing in spices and ship chandlery. The family originally came from Flanders, but moved to Amsterdam, on Nieuwendijk, close to the harbour, after Antwerp was occupied by the Spanish. Jan J. Hinlopen lived initially with his brother Jacob J. Hinlopen (1621-1679) on Leliegracht, on the corner of Keizersgracht. The brothers made money from a cloth business on the Warmoesstraat and the building of cheap houses in the Jordaan. After their mother died, who came from a rich Catholic family, they inherited a mansion, designed by Philips Vingboons, situated between Baarn, Soest and Hilversum.

Trying to make a career in the city hall, the brother were participating in the Civic guard. (Jacob J. Hinlopen had an annoying problem when the townhall was opened in 1655 with speeches and festivities. He was asked to leave the city for one day!) In 1657, Jan J. Hinlopen married Leonore Huydecoper of Maarseveen (1631-1663), the daughter of a rich and influential mayor, with a country house in Maarssen, nicely situated on the border of the river Vecht. Jan Vos mounted a performance of five shows for the occasion, with accompanying poems. Every show consisted of at least thirty to forty scenes in allegorical manner, for example on the despairs of Amsterdam during the plague epidemic:He had Apollo and Themis, then Pallas and House-Pride, enjoying plays. Caution, Cleverness, Politeness and Reasonableness stand at one side of the throne; Charm, Kindness, Pity and Wakefulness at the other... The couple had four children - Jacob, Johanna Maria, Sara and Geertrui. They were baptized in the Westerkerk.

In 1661, after his father-in-law died, Jan was offered a position in the new town hall on the Dam Square. In fall 1663, Jan J. Hinlopen lost within two weeks his youngest daughter and his wife as a consequence of the plague. According to Samuel Pepys ships from Hamburg and Amsterdam were forced to go 30 days in quarantaine. In 1664 24.148 people were buried in Amsterdam and people supposed the plague was caused by digging new canals! Jan remarried with Lucia Wijbrants, after her brother had married his sister. His only son Jacob died in 1665. Jan J. Hinlopen had himself portrayed with his new wife by Bartholomeus van der Helst, portrayed with his dead first wife and children in the background.

Death
Jan J. Hinlopen, aged 40 and rather stocky, died shortly after Van der Helst produced his painting. It is not recorded whether Jan too was a victim of the plague, but it is clearly recorded that 1664, 1665 and 1666 were also plague years and more than 10% to 15% of the population died and that everybody that came into contact with the plague was at risk. In June 1665 the Great Plague of London broke out. As in Amsterdam rich people left the cities. Sailors sailing on sea were relatively safe.

Aftermath
Johanna Maria and Sara Hinlopen were unhappy with their stepmother, not only because of the inheritance, which seems to have not been arranged very well, but because of quarrels. Lucia Wijbrants made the best of a bad bargain and remarried a mayor from Utrecht in 1672. Neither of the uncles and guardians, Jacob J. Hinlopen and mayor Joan Huydecoper of Maarsseveen, were popular to the fairly independent and very rich girls, and as soon as possible they tried to gain full independence. Joan was eager to have Johanna Maria marry her cousin, Joan's eldest son, but she significantly refused.

In 1679 Johanna Maria Hinlopen married Johan van der Merct, a lawyer from Middelburg, in the church of Amstelveen. Sara also chose a romantic location for her marriage with Albert Geelvinck: the church of Sloterdijk, in those days a popular spot to marry, and a pleasure resort only a few miles outside the citywalls and along the IJ.

Collection
After the completion in 1660, Rembrandt sold the painting Ahasuerus and Haman at the feast of Esther to Jan J. Hinlopen. This painting is possibly one of the few Rembrandt paintings whose provenance can be traced back to 1662, two year after its completion. In that year a bundle of poems by Jan Vos appeared, some about paintings in the collection of Jan J. Hinlopen. ''Here one sees Haman eating with Ahasuerus and Esther. ''But it is in vain; his breast is full of regret and pain. ''He eats Esther's food; but deeper into her heart. ''The king is mad with revenge and rage. ''The wrath of a monarch...

The reason for the painting was the play "Hester", by Johannes Serwouters (1623-1677). Provoked by the pogroms in Eastern Europe, it was performed in 1659 and dedicated to his wife Leonore. The Rembrandt is now in the collection of the Pushkin Museum).

Also in Hinlopen's house on Kloveniersburgwal were a Rubens, two paintings by Jan Lievens, one by Bartholomeus van der Helst. Jan also had two paintings by Jan Lievens (The raising of Lazarus, now in Bristol, and a Christ in the tomb), a painting of flowers by Willem van Aelst, and a Simon in the temple with Christ as a child by Gerbrand van den Eeckhout. In his sitting room hung a Venus in a cloud full of Cupids by Rubens, which he inherited from his father-in-law. Jan Vos praised Jan's collection of paintings in several poems and the pieces of amber that were given to Leonora by Frederick William, the elector of Brandenburg, and also wrote on the premature death of Jan's wife and children.

Controversy
There is a controversy among some art historians about one of the paintings by Metsu, now in the Gemäldegalerie which was already known in the 19th century as Familie des Kaufmanns Gelfing. (For an impression of the painting take a look at this URL). Gelfing should be understood as coming from the family Geelvinck, after both families Hinlopen en Geelvinck died out in 18th century. Since 1976 the painting is called by Van Eeghen La famille du Burgermeister Gillis Valckenier, Gabriel Metsu, 1657 on not very satifying grounds: the bird, which she recognized as a falcon. Her explanation on how the painting got to Switzerland is complicated and little convincing, therefor does not have to be repeated here. Besides burgomaster Gillis Valckenier had only three children at that time. Irene Groeneweg has good arguments that the bird is not a falcon but a parrot. Judith van Gent suggests that the painting in the Metropolitan Museum of Art called Visit to the nursery is depicting also the family Hinlopen (and most probably Sara Hinlopen as a baby). The provenance of that painting is clear and accepted. It comes from Jan Jacobsz. Hinlopen.

Part of Jan's collection passed to his daughter Sara, who died childless at 89 years old and almost blind at the end of her life. Most of her belongings went to the second cousin and nieces of her late husband Albert Geelvinck, though in her will there is nothing written about any painting because of succession duties.

External link

 * Portrait of Lucia Wijbrants (1667) the second wife of Jan Hinlopen, by Gabriel Metsu in the Minneapolis Institute of Art
 * Deeds of purchase by Jan or Jacob Hinlopen in the City Archives