St Paul and St Barnabas at Lystra by Willem De Poorter

Willem De Poorter

1608 - 1648

Haarlem, Netherland

The son of a Flemish émigré, Willem de Poorter was likely born in Haarlem in 1608. The circumstances of his training are not clear. It is often proposed that he studied with Rembrandt van Rijn (1606–69) in Leiden, about 1629–30. That training, however, may have occurred in Amsterdam as late as the mid-1630s, thereby constituting not a student-pupil relationship so much as a mid-career supervision. By 1633 De Poorter’s name appears in the Haarlem city archives, where he is listed as a member of the Guild of Saint Luke by 1635. Although he was documented as being in the village of Wijk bij Heusd...