Juriaen Pool II Amsterdam 1665/6 - 1745

Juriaen Pool is perhaps best known for as the husband of the still life painter Rachel Ruysch (1664-1750). Although the present picture reveals the hand of an accumplished portrait painter, little is known of Pool’s life before his marriage to Ruysch in 1693. From 1709-16 both artists were active as court painters in Düsseldorf to the Elector John William of the Palatine, after which they returned to Amsterdam. Although very few portraits are known by Pool, it would appear the present picture would predate the portrait of Rachel Ruysch in the Boyman-van Beuningen Museum, Rotterdam (c. 1715) and would seem to date from a similar period as the ‘Portrait of the Painter and his family’ in the Stadtgeschichtliches Museum, Düsseldorf.