Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Van Haecken, Joseph

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707152Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 58 — Van Haecken, Joseph1899Lionel Henry Cust

VAN HAECKEN (VAN AKEN), JOSEPH (1699?–1749), painter, was born at Antwerp about 1699. He came over to England at about the age of twenty, and was a good painter of history and portraits. He found more profitable employment, however, as painter of drapery and other accessories for Thomas Hudson (1701–1779) [q. v.], Allan Ramsay (1713–1784) [q. v.], and other portrait-painters. In this branch of art he showed remarkable excellence. Van Haecken died on 4 July 1749, and was buried in St. Pancras Church, leaving a widow, but no children. Hudson and Ramsay were executors of his will. Hogarth is stated to have drawn a caricature of a mock-funeral procession of Van Haecken, showing the distress of the painters at the loss of their indispensable assistant. Ramsay painted Van Haecken's portrait. A few portraits by Van Haecken himself were engraved in mezzotint by his younger brother, Alexander van Haecken (b. 1701), who lived with him and shared his work. A number of portraits by Amiconi, Hudson, Ramsay, and others were engraved in mezzotint by the younger Van Haecken, who carried on his brother's practice after his death.

[Walpole's Anecdotes of Painting, ed. Wornum; Vertue's Manuscripts (Brit. Mus. Addit. MS. 23074, f. 9); Chaloner Smith's British Mezzotinto Portraits.]

L. C.