Hendrick Goltzius

Hendrick Goltzius - Disability of the right hand; encouragement from his father

Hendrick Goltzius was born in January or February 1558 in Bracht near Venlo. For the son of the glass painter Jan, the path to art was predetermined, and his father gave him his first lessons. He was struck early on by a handicap that could have put a premature end to his illustrious career: While still a small child, he was caught in a fire that scorched his hands and left permanent injuries on his right hand due to mishandling; as a result, he was unable to open it fully for the rest of his life. However, Goltzius proved all the more skilful in the use of his left hand; he covered the whole house with his drawings and thus convinced his father to support his artistic education. Due to his modest financial circumstances and his mother's frequent illness, Hendrick Goltzius was forced to help out extensively around the house. Art therefore had to take a back seat, but with a great deal of patience and effort, he was able to use his lame right hand with great skill and recommend himself as an apprentice to the publisher Dirck Volkertszoon Coornhert.

Great success as an engraver and publisher

Hendrick Goltzius was very keen to prove his skills as an engraver. To this end, he travelled through Italy and Germany for several years to deepen his knowledge and refine his techniques. In Haarlem, he worked as an engraver for his master Coornhert with great success. He made such a brilliant name for himself that he could afford to set up his own publishing house in 1582, the engravings he published labelled with the self-assured reference ‘printed by Goltzius’. He was not only friends with the draughtsman and poet Karel van Mander, but also shared a studio, which was soon joined by the older painter Cornelis Cornelisz. van Haarlem. Much of the biographical information about Hendrick Goltzius was passed on by his friend Karel van Mander in his famous Schilder-Boeck. The artist's style increasingly turned towards the looser forms of Late Mannerism.

The turn to painting in later years

According to his friend and biographer Karel von Mander, Hendrick Goltzius mainly used his right hand for engraving despite his disability, while he used his left hand to guide the brush when he turned to painting in his later years. He was well over 40 years old when he increasingly ventured into painting under the influence of Mannerism. The Flemish artist Bartholomew Spranger, whose paintings Goltzius often used as models for his engravings, also served as a model for his work as a painter. The most famous engravers of their time took lessons in Goltzius' workshop, including Jakob Matham, Jan Saenredam and Pieter de Jode the Elder. Engravings after Goltzius became a popular and widespread export item and can be found in almost every museum and collection today.

Hendrick Goltzius died in Haarlem on 29th December 1616. A different source lists his date of death as 1st January 1617.