Andries van Eertvelt

The first Flemish painter to specialise fully in sea battles and storms: baptised in Antwerp Cathedral in 1590, a master of the Guild of St Luke at nineteen, active in Genoa in 1628–1630 with Cornelis de Wael — and portrayed by Anthony van Dyck himself, proof of the esteem he enjoyed among Antwerp masters. He trained the next generation of marine painters, including Gaspar van Eyck and Matthieu van Plattenberg.

The Battle of Lepanto was one of his celebrated, repeatedly painted subjects — other versions hang in the Museum of Fine Arts in Ghent and the palace museum in Schwerin, which lends our large-format variant its art-historical pedigree.