Dutch painter. He began his training at the age of 13 with the painter Arold Verbuys (1673-1717) and in 1683 was apprenticed to the portrait and genre painter Godfried Schalcken (at that time working in Dordrecht), with whom he remained for six years. After working as an independent painter in Dordrecht, he travelled to Germany, where he had considerable success as a portrait painter in Frankfurt-am-Main, Mainz and Darmstadt. He settled in Amsterdam in 1696, shortly after his return to the Netherlands, and worked successfully as a portrait and genre painter. He succeeded Nicolas Maes as the leading painter of fashionable society and visiting dignitaries, including the Tsar Peter the Great of Russia. //