Who is Jacob van Huysum?

Jacob van Huysum (1688 – 1740) was an 18th-century botanical painter from the Northern Netherlands.

Van Huysum was baptized 25 February 1688 in Amsterdam. Both his father Justus van Huysum (1659–1716), and his brother Jan van Huysum (1682–1749), were applauded flower painters. His sky of painting was unconditionally like that of his brother. His get into to botanical illustration, while preserving botanical accuracy, captured a more painterly aspect of his subject. This contrasts subsequently the meticulously correct mode of Georg Dionysius Ehret, his contemporary colleague.

Jacob arrived in England in virtually 1721, and for a though lived in the home of his patron, Mr. Lockyear of South Sea House. Later he enjoyed the patronage of Sir Robert Walpole, who befriended him, and commissioned him to paint decorative works for his house at Houghton in Norfolk. More importantly he produced most of the 50 illustrations for John Martyn’s Historia Plantarum Rariorum (London: 1728-38), and everything the drawings for Catalogus Plantarum, an index of trees, shrubs, plants and flowers (London: 1730). His pupil was Louis Fabritius Dubourg.

Historia Plantarum Rariorum depicted plants from the Chelsea Physic Garden and the Cambridge Botanic Garden. These flora and fauna had come from the Cape of fine Hope, North America, the West Indies, and Mexico. Elisha Kirkall produced the mezzotint engravings. Each plate was dedicated to a patron and showed an engraved coat-of-arms or monogram. Besides van Huysum, other artists were William Houstoun, Massey, G. Sartorys, and R. Sartorius. The show was published in five parts of ten plates each amongst 1728 and 1737, and was sold by subscription. The venture was not a financial exploit and broadcast ceased in 1737.