About Dieric Bouts

Dieric Bouts

Dieric Bouts, Leuvense Vlaamse Meester

M Leuven

Dieric Bouts (ca. 1410-1475) was one of the most important Flemish Masters. The Dutch painter moved to Leuven and married the affluent Catharina Van der Brugghen in 1448. He remained in Leuven until his death. While in Leuven, he painted 'The Last Supper' and 'The Martyrdom of Saint Erasmus', two of Bouts’ most important works that can still be seen today in their historical setting.

Dieric Bouts, Leuvense Vlaamse Meester

M Leuven

Realism

The religious scenes that Bouts depicted in a realistic and earthly setting literally remove the boundaries between heaven and earth. In this sense, Bouts is perhaps the most exemplary artist in the 15th-century tradition that sought to articulate new forms of what it means to be human. He explored the possibilities of realism and the representation of the real world so that viewers would more easily be able to identify with the message that his paintings conveyed.

 

The odd one out among the Flemish Masters

Bouts is considered the odd one out among the Flemish Masters because he consistently avoided any dramatism in his works. Due to his typical style of painting, which exudes an atmosphere of restraint, he was often called ‘the painter of silence’.

 

City painter of Leuven

In 1472, Bouts was appointed town painter of Leuven, an honorary title. The city was undergoing massive urban development at that time. This is precisely why he is an essential artist for the development of Renaissance art in a humanist town like Leuven in that period.

 

His wife died in 1473, and he remarried a year later. Bouts himself died in 1475, and he was buried beside his first wife in the Franciscan church in Leuven. Both his sons, Dieric and Albrecht, continued their father’s artistic tradition into the 16th century.