Dutch painter

Haarlem circa 1609 – after 1647 Amsterdam

 

Jan Martsen probably added ‘de jonge’, that is ‘the younger’ to some signatures of his paintings to differentiate himself from his father, who had also been a painter (and his first master), and whose first name Jacob also starts with a ‘J’. It is thought that Jan’s earliest paintings were made in The Hague under his father’s licence.

 

Jan’s name is also spelled as :

- Jan Martszen de Jonge

In English it is sometimes translated into :

- Jan Martsen or Martszen the Younger

Two authors, George S. Keyes and Jan Briels, call him :

- Jan Martens

 

Painter and engraver of battle scenes.

 

His father, Jacob(us) Martsen (Gent 1580 – 1647 Amsterdam)  was a painter specialised in portraits and genre scenes. He studied in Haarlem under Karel van Mander. 

 

Our painter was a pupil of his uncle, Esaias van de Velde (1587 – 1630). 

Jan’s father, Jacob, married Esaias’ sister Susanna in 1608; three years later Esaias married Jacob’s sister Catelyna.

Van de Velde was born in Amsterdam, where he remained until 1609, from 1609 until 1617 he lived in Haarlem, and from 1618 until his death in 1630 in The Hague.

 

Jan Martsen remained in Haarlem during his youth until 1625. That year he moved with his father to Amsterdam. In 1626 both father and son moved to The Hague, where Jacob joined the Painter’s Guild. Jan’s new master, his uncle Esaias van de Velde, had been active here since 1618.

In 1629 Jan settled in his birthplace Haarlem. Except for a 5-year stay (following his marriage) in Amsterdam (1633 – 1638) he is documented in Haarlem until 1645.

At some stage Jan must also have been active in Delft.

 

Jan Martsen’s early paintings, during the late 1620s, were strongly influenced by his uncle, Esaias van de Velde. Later he was influenced by Palamedes Palamedesz., who had also been a pupil of Esaias van de Velde.

 

All three Esaias van de Velde, Anthonie Palamedesz. (the elder brother of Palamedes Palamedesz.) and Jan Martsen have been painting figures in some of the architectural scenes of Bartholomeus van Bassen (circa 1590 – 1652). Antwerp-born van Bassen was active in Delft between 1613 and 1622 and from 1622 until his death thirty years later in The Hague.

 

Jan Martsen had one pupil: Jan Asselijn. He studied with Jan Martsen in Amsterdam. His earliest paintings, from 1634 and 1635, are battle scenes, showing the strong influence of his master. Asselijn subsequently dropped this subject, only to paint it briefly again around 1646, when he was active in Lyon and Paris, before returning to Amsterdam. Asselijn is foremost known as an important Italianate landscape and genre painter, a ‘Bamboccianto’ active in Rome between circa 1635 and 1644.