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Equestrian Portrait of Cornelis (1639–1680) and Michiel Pompe van Meerdervoort (1638–1653) with Their Tutor and Coachman ("Starting for the Hunt") by Aelbert Cuyp

Aelbert Cuyp · 1652-01-01

View the artwork: Equestrian Portrait of Cornelis (1639–1680) and Michiel Pompe van Meerdervoort (1638–1653) with Their Tutor and Coachman ("Starting for the Hunt") →

Equestrian Portrait of Cornelis and Michiel Pompe van Meerdervoort with Their Tutor and Coachman, also known as "Starting for the Hunt," is a painting by Aelbert Cuyp from around 1652-53. It lives at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Its most arresting fact is not visible: young Michiel Pompe van Meerdervoort, the boy in silver-gray at the center, would be dead at fifteen. The painting is his only surviving portrait.

The eye goes first to the bright red coat of Cornelis on the left, a deliberate signal of wealth and martial ambition. But let your gaze settle on Michiel. Cuyp renders his softer features with an individualized care that carries a biographical weight the artist could not have known it would hold. The warm golden light that bathes the scene is pure Cuyp, a signature effect that makes a Dutch river delta feel almost Italian, which makes the stillness of that central face feel even more intimate.

This work is an early example of an equestrian portrait painted for a family that was not royal. The Pompe van Meerdervoorts were a prominent Dordrecht family, and Cuyp, together with his father, helped pioneer the grand mounted portrait for a wealthy merchant class eager to claim the visual language of the nobility. The ruined castle in the background is not their real house, but a symbol of ancient lineage they wished to project.

What began as a celebration of a family's ascent was redefined by loss. Michiel died in 1653. Cornelis lived to be eighty. The painting outlasted them both, but it is Michiel's thirteen-year-old face, preserved in that golden afternoon, that stays with you. What do you see in his expression knowing what the future held?

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Details

The brightest color in the composition; in 17th-century Dutch portraiture, rich red signals wealth and martial ambition , a deliberate costume choice to echo royal equestrian tradition.
The brightest color in the composition; in 17th-century Dutch portraiture, rich red signals wealth and martial ambition , a deliberate costume choice to echo royal equestrian tradition.
The dark foliage frames the right side and provides a repoussoir that pushes the figures forward; the warm backlight catching the leaf edges is a virtuoso atmospheric passage.
The dark foliage frames the right side and provides a repoussoir that pushes the figures forward; the warm backlight catching the leaf edges is a virtuoso atmospheric passage.
Hunting dogs confirm this is a departure-for-the-hunt scene; greyhounds were expensive status animals, and their lean silhouettes add elegant line to the base of the composition.
Hunting dogs confirm this is a departure-for-the-hunt scene; greyhounds were expensive status animals, and their lean silhouettes add elegant line to the base of the composition.
Powerfully foreshortened; the bridle and chest-band detail reward close inspection and demonstrate Cuyp's equine draftsmanship , horses are his signature subject.
Powerfully foreshortened; the bridle and chest-band detail reward close inspection and demonstrate Cuyp's equine draftsmanship , horses are his signature subject.
Cuyp's most celebrated effect , a warm Italianate golden haze over a Dutch landscape; the light bathes every surface and is the technique most associated with his signature style.
Cuyp's most celebrated effect , a warm Italianate golden haze over a Dutch landscape; the light bathes every surface and is the technique most associated with his signature style.
Transcript

They look like any rich brothers, out for a hunt. Cornelis, in red, was fourteen. His brother Michiel, in silver-gray, was thirteen. This painting was a new kind of portrait, one of the first of non-nobles on horseback. Two years after it was finished, Michiel died. His face here is the only one we have.