Adam Frans van der Meulen or Adam-François van der MeulenAdam Frans van der Meulen
at the

Netherlands Institute for Art History The Netherlands Institute for Art History or RKD (Dutch: RKD-Nederlands Instituut voor Kunstgeschiedenis), previously Rijksbureau voor Kunsthistorische Documentatie (RKD), is located in The Hague and is home to the largest art history center i ...

(11 January 163215 October 1690) was a Flemish painter and draughtsman who was particularly known for his scenes of military campaigns and conquests.Christine van Mulders. "Meulen, Adam Frans van der." Grove Art Online. Oxford Art Online. Oxford University Press. Web. 4 September 2017 Van der Meulen also painted portraits, hunting scenes, paintings of chateaux and landscapes. He created designs for prints and

cartoon A cartoon is a type of visual art that is typically drawn, frequently animated, in an unrealistic or semi-realistic style. The specific meaning has evolved over time, but the modern usage usually refers to either: an image or series of images ...

s for tapestries.Hans Vlieghe,
Flemish Art and Architecture, 1585-1700
', Pelican history of art, New Haven: Yale University Press (1998): 173. He worked in the service of the French king

Louis XIV of France , house = Bourbon , father = Louis XIII , mother = Anne of Austria , birth_date = , birth_place = Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye, Saint-Germain-en-Laye, France , death_date = , death_place = Palace of Versa ...

for whom he painted his victories, his new possessions and portraits. He was instrumental in building the propagandistic image of the French king as the 'Sun King'. His battle scenes had an important influence on the development on the genre of military painting in France.R. Wellington, 'The cartographic origins of Adam Frans van der Meulen's Marly cycle', Print Quarterly 28 (2011), p. 142-154

Life

Adam Frans van der Meulen was born in Brussels where he was baptized on 11 January 1632. (pp. 130-131) He was the eldest of the seven children of Pieter van der Meulen and his second wife Maria van Steenwegen. His father was a respected notary. He was registered on 5 March 1651 at the Brussels

Guild of Saint Luke The Guild of Saint Luke was the most common name for a city guild for painters and other artists in early modern Europe, especially in the Low Countries. They were named in honor of the Evangelist Luke, the patron saint of artists, who was ide ...

as the pupil of

Peter Snayers Peter Snayers or Pieter Snayers (1592–1667) was a Flemish painter known for his panoramic battle scenes, depictions of cavalry skirmishes, attacks on villages, coaches and convoys and hunting scenes. (p. 241-243, v.1; plate 92, v.2)Hans V ...

. Snayers was a painter from Antwerp who had moved to Brussels to work for the court. He specialized in pictures of battles, attacks on convoys and civilians and hunting scenes. Van der Meulen became a master of the

in Brussels on 5 March 1651. Adam Frans van der Meulen - The entry of King Louis XIV and Queen Maria-Theresa in Arras on 30 July 1667

Van der Meulen's earliest works dealt with the same subject matter as those of his master Snayers, in particular cavalry skirmishes. He was also known for depicting courtly retinues mounted on their horses. His reputation for this type of scene as well as his skill in the painting of horses reached France.Isabelle Richefort, ''Cheval noir galopant d' Adam-François Van der Meulen Une étude retrouvée de l'ancien fonds des Gobelins''
This led to the artist being called to Paris where he entered into the service of Louis XIV on 1 April 1664.

Jean-Baptiste Colbert Jean-Baptiste Colbert (; 29 August 1619 – 6 September 1683) was a French statesman who served as First Minister of State from 1661 until his death in 1683 under the rule of King Louis XIV. His lasting impact on the organization of the countr ...

, the powerful surintendant des Bâtiments, Arts et Manufactures (Superintendent of Buildings, Arts and Manufactures) and later minister of finance, is believed to have been behind the royal appointment of van der Meulen. Colbert had been charged with immortalizing the military successes of Louis XIV. To achieve this propagandistic purpose, he had come up with the idea to create a series of tapestries that would show the heroic deeds of the king.Julie Anne Plax, ''Seventeenth-Century French Images of Warfare'', in: Pia F. Cuneo, 'Artful Armies, Beautiful Battles: Art and Warfare in the Early Modern Europe', BRILL, 2002, pp. 131–155 The court painter (Premier peintre du roi)

Charles Le Brun Charles Le Brun (baptised 24 February 1619 – 12 February 1690) was a French painter, physiognomist, art theorist, and a director of several art schools of his time. As court painter to Louis XIV, who declared him "the greatest French artist of ...

had been put in charge of the

Gobelins Manufactory The Gobelins Manufactory () is a historic tapestry factory in Paris, France. It is located at 42 avenue des Gobelins, near Les Gobelins métro station in the 13th arrondissement of Paris. It was originally established on the site as a medieval ...

, the royal tapestry works newly created in 1663, and was officially appointed its director on 8 March 1663. To realize Colbert's project of a series of tapestries on the king's military campaigns, Le Brun sought to surround himself with a team of painters who would be capable of translating his ideas into tapestries and van der Meulen was recruited to assist Le Brun in this project. Van der Meulen's varied skills were particularly appreciated for this purpose.Sjoerd de Vries, ''Adam-Frans van der Meulen (1632-1690), hofschilder van Lodewijk XIV, in de Republiek: 1672-1673''
in: Jaarboek Monumentenzorg 1990, Waanders Uitgevers, Zwolle / Rijksdienst voor de Monumentenzorg, Zeist 1990, pp. 134-147 Van der Meulen's reputation as a skilled painter of horses has been cited as one of the reasons why he was solicited to work in France. Van der Meulen was involved in the design of multiple tapestry series. He first worked on the series of ''The History of the King'' for which he created the scenes of the military conquests. As the design work involved a lot of work, van der Meulen invited other Flemish artists to assist him with his designs. The landscape artist

Adriaen Frans Boudewijns Adriaen Frans Boudewijns (Brussels, 3 October 1644 – Brussels, 3 December 1719) was a Flemish landscape painter, draughtsman and etcher. He was known mainly for his landscapes with trees, Italianate landscapes with architecture, rivers and ...

entered in 1666 into a 3-year contract to work in the service of Adam Frans van der Meulen. When van der Meulen worked on the design of 12

Gobelin Gobelin was the name of a family of dyers, who in all probability came originally from Reims, France, and who in the middle of the 15th century established themselves in the Faubourg Saint Marcel, Paris, on the banks of the Bièvre. The firs ...

s representing the months for King

Louis XIV , house = Bourbon , father = Louis XIII , mother = Anne of Austria , birth_date = , birth_place = Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye, Saint-Germain-en-Laye, France , death_date = , death_place = Palace of Vers ...

, van der Meulen executed the smaller figures and part of the landscapes while the remainder of the landscapes was completed by Boudewijns and

Abraham Genoels Abraham Genoels II or Abraham Genouil (nickname: Archimedes) (25 May 1640, Antwerp – 10 May 1723, Antwerp) was a Flemish Baroque painter, draughtsman, engraver and tapestry designer. He is now mainly known for his landscape paintings, drawings ...

, another Flemish painter active in Paris. While in Paris, Boudewijns also engraved many of van der Meulen's compositions.

Adolphe Siret Adolphe Siret (July 15, 1818 – January 6, 1888) was a Belgian historian, biographer, essayist, poet, biographer, writer and man of letters.Adrien-François Boudewyns'', in: Biographie Nationale, Volume 2, p. 788-795, Brussels, 1868 Boudewijns married the sister of van der Meulen called Barbe or Barbara on 12 January 1670. From 1668 van der Meulen worked on the series of tapestries called the 'Maisons royales' ('Royal Residences') depicting the various palaces of the king.Thomas P. Campbell, Pascal-François Bertrand, Jeri Bapasola, ''Tapestry in the Baroque: Threads of Splendor'', Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, N.Y.), 2007 Van der Meulen's career in France took off rapidly. His annual wages at the Gobelins Manufactory were regularly increased and he was in 1666 one of its best-paid artists. He accompanied Louis XIV during his campaign through Flanders during the

War of Devolution In the 1667 to 1668 War of Devolution (, ), France occupied large parts of the Spanish Netherlands and Franche-Comté, both then provinces of the Holy Roman Empire (and properties of the King of Spain). The name derives from an obscure law known ...

. He made drawings of various cities including

Turnhout Turnhout () is a Belgium, Belgian Municipalities in Belgium, municipality and city located in the Flemish Region, Flemish Provinces of Belgium, province of Antwerp (province), Antwerp. The municipality comprises only the city of Turnhout proper. ...

Kortrijk Kortrijk ( , ; vls, Kortryk or ''Kortrik''; french: Courtrai ; la, Cortoriacum), sometimes known in English as Courtrai or Courtray ( ), is a Belgian City status in Belgium, city and Municipalities in Belgium, municipality in the Flemish Regio ...

Oudenaarde Oudenaarde (; french: Audenarde ; in English sometimes ''Oudenarde'') is a Belgian municipality in the Flemish province of East Flanders. The municipality comprises the city of Oudenaarde proper and the towns of Bevere, Edelare, Eine, Ename, Heu ...

, Aalst and

Lille Lille ( , ; nl, Rijsel ; pcd, Lile; vls, Rysel) is a city in the northern part of France, in French Flanders. On the river Deûle, near France's border with Belgium, it is the capital of the Hauts-de-France Regions of France, region, the Pref ...

. His paintings representing the campaigns of

Flanders Flanders (, ; Dutch: ''Vlaanderen'' ) is the Flemish-speaking northern portion of Belgium and one of the communities, regions and language areas of Belgium. However, there are several overlapping definitions, including ones related to culture, ...

in 1667 so delighted the King that from that date van der Meulen was ordered to accompany him on all his expeditions. He accompanied le Grand Condé during his campaign through

Bourgogne-Franche-Comté Bourgogne-Franche-Comté (; , sometimes abbreviated BFC; Arpitan: ''Borgogne-Franche-Comtât'') is a region in Eastern France created by the 2014 territorial reform of French regions, from a merger of Burgundy and Franche-Comté. The new region ...

Adam Frans van der Meulen - Battle (1657)

He obtained in 1669 the royal privilege to have his works engraved. He was appointed ''peintre ordinaire du Roy'' (ordinary painter to the king) in 1673. In the same year he was received into the

Académie royale de peinture et de sculpture The Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture (; en, "Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture") was founded in 1648 in Paris, France. It was the premier art institution of France during the latter part of the Ancien Régime until it was abol ...

(Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture) without having to submit a

reception piece In art, a reception piece is a work submitted by an artist to an academy for approval as part of the requirements for admission to membership. The piece is normally representative of the artist's work, and the organization's judgement of its skil ...

as was usually the case. He attained the grade of councilor in the Academy in 1681 and that of principal councilor in 1688. Van der Meulen made a total of nine trips to document King Louis XIV's military campaigns. He enjoyed all kinds of facilities at his job: he had his own coach, took his meals with the officers, and had an assistant called Jean Paul who helped him with the drawings. This assistant artist has remained unidentified and was referred to by van der Meulen as 'mon homme' ('my man') without further specification. Van der Meulen followed in 1673 Louis XIV during the

Franco-Dutch War The Franco-Dutch War, also known as the Dutch War (french: Guerre de Hollande; nl, Hollandse Oorlog), was fought between France and the Dutch Republic, supported by its allies the Holy Roman Empire, Spain, Brandenburg-Prussia and Denmark-Nor ...

, accompanied by Jean Paul. The two artist made drawings of about 32 cities that were conquered by the French during the campaign. Later he also made drawings of

Blois Blois ( ; ) is a commune and the capital city of Loir-et-Cher department, in Centre-Val de Loire, France, on the banks of the lower Loire river between Orléans and Tours. With 45,898 inhabitants by 2019, Blois is the most populated city of the ...

Amboise Amboise (; ) is a commune in the Indre-et-Loire department in central France. Today a small market town, it was once home of the French royal court. Geography Amboise lies on the banks of the river Loire, east of Tours. It is also about away f ...

and

Chambord Chambord can refer to: * Chambord (liqueur), a brand of raspberry-flavored liqueur * Château de Chambord, a French ''château'' built in the 16th century * Chambord, Loir-et-Cher, the French commune where the ''château'' is located * Chambord, ...

in France. He further worked in Maastricht in 1674 and in Flanders between April 1676 and 1677. In the wake of further campaigns in Flanders by generals le Grand Condé and

Henri de la Tour d'Auvergne, Vicomte de Turenne Henri de La Tour d'Auvergne, vicomte de Turenne (11 September 161127 July 1675), commonly known as Turenne , was a French general and one of only six Marshal of France, Marshals to have been promoted Marshal General of France. The most illustr ...

he visited along with Le Brun and

André Le Nôtre André Le Nôtre (; 12 March 1613 – 15 September 1700), originally rendered as André Le Nostre, was a French landscape architect and the principal gardener of King Louis XIV of France. He was the landscape architect who designed the gar ...

in 1677 Cambrai, Valenciennes, Saint-Omer, Mont Cassel and Cassel. Adam Frans van der Meulen - View of the City of Luxemburg from the baths of Mansfeld (taken on 3 June 1684)

Adam Frans van der Meulen - View of the City of Luxemburg from the baths of Mansfeld (taken on 3 June 1684)

In 1679 he was commissioned to picture the new French territories, which were allocated after the

Peace of Nijmegen The Treaties of Peace of Nijmegen ('; german: Friede von Nimwegen) were a series of treaties signed in the Dutch city of Nijmegen between August 1678 and October 1679. The treaties ended various interconnected wars among France, the Dutch Republi ...

. During this trip he met the Flemish landscape painter Cornelis Huysmans near

Dinant Dinant () is a City status in Belgium, city and Municipalities in Belgium, municipality of Wallonia located in the Namur Province, province of Namur, Belgium. On the shores of river Meuse, in the Ardennes, it lies south-east of Brussels, south ...

. He tried to convince Huysmans to join him in Paris as a designer at the Gobelins Manufactory but Huysmans declined. Later that year he was in Dinant and in the years 1681 and 1682 he was in

Strasbourg Strasbourg (, , ; german: Straßburg ; gsw, label=Bas Rhin Alsatian, Strossburi , gsw, label=Haut Rhin Alsatian, Strossburig ) is the prefecture and largest city of the Grand Est region of eastern France and the official seat of the Eu ...

where he drew the newly acquired French possessions of Strasbourg and

Lorraine Lorraine , also , , ; Lorrain: ''Louréne''; Lorraine Franconian: ''Lottringe''; german: Lothringen ; lb, Loutrengen; nl, Lotharingen is a cultural and historical region in Northeastern France, now located in the administrative region of Gr ...

. Van der Meulen had married Catharine Huseweel before he moved to France. The couple had several children. One son, Louis who was born on 20 March 1669 was baptized on 27 March 1669 in the chapel of the Tuileries by the archbishop of Nazianze and coadjutor of Reims and had King Louis XIV as godfather and

Anne Marie Louise d'Orléans, Duchess of Montpensier Anne Marie Louise d'Orléans, Duchess of Montpensier, (, – ) known as ''La Grande Mademoiselle'', was the only daughter of Gaston d'Orléans with his first wife, Marie de Bourbon, Duchess of Montpensier. One of the greatest heiresses in ...

as godmother. His first wife died in January 1677. On 22 March 1679 he signed a marriage contract with Catherine Lobry, daughter of a captain of the guard of Count Bassigni. She died already on 4 October 1680. He married 20-year-old Marie de Bye, a cousin of Charles Le Brun on 12 January 1681. The couple had many children of whom one was born posthumously. He painted the designs for the decorations of the Ambassadors Staircase, the grand staircase of the King's apartment at Versailles (four trompe l'oeil tapestries representing the taking of various towns, 1677). From 1679 he worked on the large-scale paintings of The King's Conquests (''Les conquêtes du Roi'') intended for the decoration of the Royal Pavilion of Marly on which he worked until his death in 1690.Claire Mazel, ''Isabelle Richefort, Adam-François Van der Meulen, peintre flamand au service de Louis XIV, Rennes, Presses universitaires de Rennes, 2004, 313 p.''
in: Revue d’histoire moderne et contemporaine, 2008/4 (n° 55-4), p. 190 Marly was a new pleasure residence built for the King as an architectural fantasy, with twelve little pavilions and elegant Royal Pavilion laid out on a square plan. The four apartments of the pavilion were separated by vestibules with as only decoration two marble tables with above them two large paintings of The King's Conquests by van der Meulen.Adam Frans van der Meulen and Workshop, ''Siege of Oudenaarde''
at Alexis Bordes Van der Meulen was commissioned by

to create smaller replicas of his paintings of conquests to decorate the

Château de Choisy The Château de Choisy was a royal French residence in the commune of Choisy-le-Roi in the Val-de-Marne department, not far from Paris. The commune was given its present name by Louis XV, when he purchased the manor of Choisy and its château in Oc ...

(1680-1688), and then by Louvois to decorate the

Château de Meudon Meudon Castle, also known as the Royal Castle of Meudon or Imperial Palace of Meudon, is a French castle located in Meudon in the Hauts-de-Seine department. At the edge of a wooded plateau, the castle offers views of Paris and the Seine, as we ...

. He died in Paris in 1690. After his death, seals were affixed to his apartment and studio, as had been the case at the time of Le Brun's death a short time before, since Louis XIV asserted his royal privilege. As van der Meulen was an ordinary painter to the King, and resided at the Manufacture des Gobelins, the sovereign ordered a number of works to be seized, which he thought proper to be returned to him. Adam Frans van der Meulen - View of the march of the army of the king on Kortrijk on 18 July 1667

Adam Frans van der Meulen - View of the march of the army of the king on Kortrijk on 18 July 1667

His pupils and workshop assistants included Saveur Lecomte, Mathieu Dufresnet, Dominicus Nollet, Gérard Jean Baptiste Scotin (II),

Nicolas de Largillière Nicolas de Largillière (; 10 October 1656 – 20 March 1746) was a French portrait painter, born in Paris. Biography Early life Largillière's father, a merchant, took him to Antwerp at the age of three. As a boy, he spent nearly two years in ...

Jan van Huchtenburg J(oh)an and Jacob van Huchtenburg (also known as Hughtenburg or Hugtenburg(h)) were two Dutch Golden Age painters in the second half of the seventeenth century. Both brothers were natives of Haarlem, moved to Paris, but died in Amsterdam. The ma ...

Jean-Baptiste Martin Jean-Baptiste Martin, known as "Martin des Batailles" (1659, Paris - 8 October 1735, Paris) was a French painter, decorator and designer who specialized in drawings for tapestries. He was best known for battle scenes, hence his nickname. Biogra ...

and François Duchatel.Inga Morris, ''Adam Franz Van Der Meulen (1632-1690)'', Westfälischen Wilhelms-Universität, Münster, 1970, p. 68

Work

Van der Meulen was one of the foremost battle painters of his time. He is also known for his many topographical drawings, which he made as preparations for his battle pieces. He painted equestrian portraits and painted and drew many animal studies. His works always retained their Flemish character in terms of color, although his style was modified by that of the French school. The most important portion of van der Meulen's work is made up of battle scenes. His early works in this genre were close in style to those of his master Pieter Snayers. These early works from the 1650s depicted scenes of fighting horsemen. Like Snayers he frequently represented a village under attack. These works relish in the depiction of the whirling melee of horsemen and horses itself, as if in distant response to Leonardo's

Battle of Anghiari The Battle of Anghiari was fought on 29 June 1440, between the forces of Milan and the League of some Italian states led by the Republic of Florence in the course of the Wars in Lombardy. The battle was a victory for the Florentines, securing F ...

Adam Frans van der Meulen - Study of a white horse

After moving to France and becoming the official war artist of Louis XIV during the multiple military French campaigns in Europe of the late 17th century, van der Meulen developed a new approach to his depictions of battles. He excluded the horror and morbid rawness of the events.''Le Passage du Rhin en 1672''
at the collections du Musée des Beaux-arts de Dijon Rather than concentrate on the heat of the action from close up, he used the compositional device of a crowded elevated foreground behind which there is a plunging wide panoramic landscape. The characters whom the artist aims to give the key role in the scene are placed on a mound in the foreground, often mounted on horseback to give them more dignity. On a second plane is typically depicted the supposed movement of the troops and in a third and last plane the profile of the city being attacked. The action is depicted in receding planes accentuated by the folds of the terrain, the alternation of zones of shadow and light and the gradual fading of the light, which marks a view towards a city in the distance. The use of the same compositional scheme gives an impression of unity to many of his paintings as only the profile of the city is different. The uniformity of these compositions can be explained by their use for political purposes. Nevertheless, the paintings of the artist were always praised for their beauty and their use for the decoration of the Royal Pavilion of Marly, for the vestibules as well as for the rooms, shows the fully decorative virtue of his animated and varied landscapes. Adam Frans van der Meulen - The crossing of the Rhine on 12 June 1672

Adam Frans van der Meulen - The crossing of the Rhine on 12 June 1672

The features of his style are clearly visible in the large cycle of paintings of ''Les conquêtes du Roi'' made for the Royal Pavilion of Marly. One of the most popular compositions in this series was the one depicting ''The crossing of the Rhine on 12 June 1672''. Many versions of this composition exist, made with different levels of involvement of his workshop (the

Louvre The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is the world's most-visited museum, and an historic landmark in Paris, France. It is the home of some of the best-known works of art, including the ''Mona Lisa'' and the ''Venus de Milo''. A central l ...

Musée des Beaux-Arts de Caen The Musée des Beaux-Arts de Caen is a fine arts museum in the French city of Caen, founded at the start of the 19th century and rebuilt in 1971 within the ducal château. History Opening On September 1, 1801, the Minister of Interior Jean-A ...

Musée des Beaux-Arts de Dijon The Musée des Beaux-Arts de Dijon is a museum of fine arts opened in 1787 in Dijon, France. It is one of the main and oldest museums of France. It is located in the historic city centre of Dijon and housed in the former ducal palace which was ...

Rijksmuseum The Rijksmuseum () is the national museum of the Netherlands dedicated to Dutch arts and history and is located in Amsterdam. The museum is located at the Museum Square in the borough of Amsterdam South, close to the Van Gogh Museum, the St ...

Philadelphia Museum of Art The Philadelphia Museum of Art (PMoA) is an art museum originally chartered in 1876 for the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia. The main museum building was completed in 1928 on Fairmount, a hill located at the northwest end of the Benjamin Fr ...

Palace of Versailles The Palace of Versailles ( ; french: Château de Versailles ) is a former royal residence built by King Louis XIV located in Versailles, Yvelines, Versailles, about west of Paris, France. The palace is owned by the French Republic and since 19 ...

, private collections). The event depicted is the crossing of the Rhine by the French troops during the Franco-Dutch War. The crossing did not involve any military engagement with the Dutch troops and solely involved the French troops wading through the Rhine when the water was low. Nevertheless, this event was described in contemporary French propaganda as a feat equal to those of

Alexander the Great Alexander III of Macedon ( grc, wikt:Ἀλέξανδρος, Ἀλέξανδρος, Alexandros; 20/21 July 356 BC – 10/11 June 323 BC), commonly known as Alexander the Great, was a king of the Ancient Greece, ancient Greek kingdom of Maced ...

and Emperor

Constantine the Great Constantine I ( , ; la, Flavius Valerius Constantinus, ; ; 27 February 22 May 337), also known as Constantine the Great, was Roman emperor from AD 306 to 337, the first one to Constantine the Great and Christianity, convert to Christiani ...

. Many writers and visual artists eulogized the French king for this exploit. The various depictions misrepresent, however, the actual history of the event. Louis XIV was in fact not present at the crossing of the Rhine as he was at the time staying with his brother

Philippe I, Duke of Orléans '' Monsieur'' Philippe I, Duke of Orléans (21 September 1640 – 9 June 1701), was the younger son of King Louis XIII of France and his wife, Anne of Austria. His elder brother was the "Sun King", Louis XIV. Styled Duke of Anjou from bir ...

in the monastery in Elterberg. Van der Meulen's paintings of the crossing of the Rhine, which show Louis XIV in the foreground commanding the action are thus a conscious misrepresentation of history for propaganda purposes. In the version in the Louvre van der Meulen has placed Louis XIV at the heart of the event, in the immediate vicinity of danger, thus emphasizing the king's courage and power. The king eclipses the other personages: his brother

and le Grand Condé who had planned the maneuver, are placed behind the sovereign.Stéphane Blond, ''Le passage du Rhin par Louis XIV''
December 2013, on: Histoire par l'image A similar propagandistic purpose was present in the prints that were made after van der Meulen's designs. The inscriptions underneath the prints made after The King's Conquests were written by

Claude-François Ménestrier Claude-François Ménestrier (9 March 1631 – 21 January 1705) was a French heraldist, writer, member of the Society of Jesus esuit and attendant of the royal court. Ménestrier was born in Lyon. He composed numerous books on heraldry, in ...

, a French heraldist and Jesuit who was an attendant of the royal court. These inscriptions invariably highlight the direct involvement of the French king in the glorious events being depicted and thus go beyond a simple description of the events. It is clear that the contemporary perception was that these works were made to preserve the memory of the king's military feats for posterity.Robert Wellington, ''Antiquarianism and the Visual Histories of Louis XIV: Artifacts for a Future Past'', Routledge, 5 July 2017 The engraved portrait of van der Meulen created by

Pieter van Schuppen Pieter van Schuppen, known in France also as Pierre Louis van Schuppen (Antwerp, 5 September 1627 – Paris, 7 March 1702) was a Flemish painter and engraver who was mainly active in France, where he enjoyed a reputation for his portrait prints.

after a painting by Nicolas de Largillière confirms this. Underneath the portrait of the painter appears the following inscription, which does not mention van der Meulen, but rather speaks of the King as a painter: 'C'est de Louis Le Grand le Peintre incomparable, Qui de ses plus beaux faits a peint la verité, Et qui sans le secours des couleurs de la fable, Le Fait Voir ce qu'il est a la Posterité.' ('It is of Louis the Great, the incomparable painter, who has painted the truth with his beautiful deeds and without the aid of the colours of fables, shows what he is to posterity').Matthew Dupuis, ''Charles Lebrun: Painting the King and the king of painting'', Department of Art History Mcgill University, Montreal, A thesis submitted to the Faculty of Graduate Studies and Research in Partial Fulfilment of the Requirements of the Degree of Master of Arts The various versions depict the King in the company of different personages although they are placed in the same place in the composition. It is possible that these variations were made at the behest of the patron for whom a particular version was created. The cycle of paintings made for the Royal Pavilion at Marly were very successful. They led to a fashion for decorating palaces and public buildings with paintings representing military scenes. The process in which the large compositions were created has been studied by art historians. It is known that van der Meulen was present at some of the military actions that he depicted. He also visited the locations of the actions afterwards and spent much time making topographical sketches of the landscapes and cities that were depicted in his battle scenes. He often relied on other artists to assist with these sketches. He even used prints by other artists as a basis for his compositions as in the case of his painting of the siege of

Utrecht Utrecht ( , , ) is the List of cities in the Netherlands by province, fourth-largest city and a List of municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality of the Netherlands, capital and most populous city of the Provinces of the Netherlands, pro ...

. The views of Utrecht in the painting are very similar to prints of Utrecht by the Dutch painter

Herman Saftleven Herman Saftleven the Younger (1609 - 5 January 1685 (buried)), was a Dutch painter of the Baroque period. Biography Born in Rotterdam, Saftleven lived most of his life (1632–1685) in Utrecht. His brothers, Cornelis Saftleven (1607–1681) ...

. Van der Meulen integrated these views and profiles into his vast compositions. They were also used for the design of tapestries as well as for prints. Research has shown that a number of prints depicting Louis XIV's conquests were made before the paintings depicting the same scenes were made. In other words, some of the prints were the basis for the later paintings rather than the other way around. Van der Meulen also painted several studies of horses. His studies of horses constituted a directory that the painter could use in his compositions as well as serve as models for his apprentices. The Dutch engraver Jan van Huchtenburg engraved a series of his sketches of horses killed in combat. Van der Meulen enjoyed a reputation for his skill at painting horses. Van der Meulen was granted a royal patent to have his original designs engraved and published. He put together a team of painters-printmakers to engrave his designs. Many of these printmakers came from Flanders and the Dutch Republic such as Adriaen Frans Boudewijns, Abraham Genoels,

and

Romeyn de Hooghe Romeyn de Hooghe (bapt. 10 September 1645 – 10 June 1708) was a late Dutch Baroque painter, sculptor, engraver and caricaturist. Biography He was born in Amsterdam, and was a skilled etcher, draughtsman, painter, sculptor and medalis ...

. The French engraver Robert Bonnart trained with van der Meulen and sold prints on his behalf.Peter Fuhring, Louis Marchesano, Remi Mathis, Vanessa Selbach, ''A Kingdom of Images: French Prints in the Age of Louis XIV, 1660–1715'', Getty Publications, 18 June 2015, p. 276-278 Van der Meulen arranged for many of his drawings and paintings representing landscapes and scenes of the military life to be engraved. These were intended for a clientele of private clients. He and later his widow sold the prints from their lodgings at the Gobelin Manufacture. Later he hired publishers and merchants to distribute his prints. He arranged in 1670 for 13 large-scale plates representing sieges, the taking of towns and royal castles to be executed for the King's Cabinet. These were acquired by the Crown, which used them to make prints that were published by the Royal Printing Office for collectors in 1679. The painter succeeded in selling to the king in 1685 prints taken from new plates, and then arranged for the sale to the public of a second edition of prints which represented the series of The King's Conquests he had made for Marly.

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* {{DEFAULTSORT:Meulen, Adam Frans van der 1632 births 1690 deaths Flemish Baroque painters Flemish portrait painters Flemish genre painters Flemish war artists Equine artists Flemish tapestry artists Artists from Brussels Painters from Brussels French tapestry artists