Gerard SOEST (1600 - 1681, Netherlands)
Portrait of a Young Boy
oil on canvas
35.5 x 30.5 inches, inc. frame
Price: £15,000 GBP
Gerard Soest (circa 1600 – 11 February 1681), also known as Gerald Soest, was a portrait painter who was active in England during the late 17th century. He is most famous for his portraits of William Shakespeare and Samuel Butler, but painted many members of the English gentry.
Soest was traditionally thought to have come from Soest, Germany in Westphalia, but was probably from Soest, Netherlands, being Dutch by birth and training.
His style is very similar to that of other Dutch portraitists in the mid-seventeenth century. His sitters are well-characterised, conventionally posed with smoothly painted faces. Interestingly, the hands of his sitters often appear slightly swollen. Despite his success as a painter, Soest received some criticism from women who felt that their portraits were not flattering enough. It is said that because of this, between 1660 and 1667 Soest refused to paint any women at all!