Arnold Frans Rubens Art for Sale at Auction

Painter, Battle painter, Landscape painter

Arnold Frans Rubens or Rubbens (1687–1719) was a Flemish Baroque painter who specialized in cabinet pictures of landscapes and battle scenes.

Life: Rubens was born in Antwerp as the son of art dealer Arnold Rubbens and Catharina Pannens. Little is known about his life and training. He may have studied mainly on his own by copying paintings and prints that were available in his father's shop. He became a master in the Antwerp Guild of Saint Luke in 1715-1716.

He married in 1710 with Ursula Verbist. The couple had two daughters and three sons of whom one was called Peter Pauwel.

Jacob de Vil became his pupil in 1715-1716. The artist died young in Antwerp.

Work: His work consists mainly of cabinet paintings that depict landscapes and battle scenes. Many of his landscapes are river landscapes or seascapes. The battles are often placed in antiquity or an oriental setting. He also copied paintings of his famous namesake Peter Paul Rubens to whom he is not believed to have been directly related. This includes the painting of the Battle of the Amazons (now in the Calderdale Metropolitan Borough Council Museums and Arts). He was influenced by the Antwerp painter Jan Baptist van der Meiren who was commercially successful with paintings depicting similar subjects.