Tagged With: Antwerp
Less is more
I have been sidetracked the last week or so by a book called The Kindly Ones by Jonathan Littell. It is a story of a man who owns a lace factory in post-warFrance, but was a former SS intelligence officer in World War II. This is his memoir. It is a fictional tale, but reads like … Continue reading
Mothers, Families and Springtime
The theme we have chosen for the blogs this month is Mothers (along with anything else that the theme inspires). Thanks to the sterling help of Annie in our group I now know that the van Aken brothers, Joseph and Alexander, had both their mother and father, Barbara and Peter van Haecken, living in London … Continue reading
Romance: Instructions Peculiarly adapted to Young Women
It never ceases to amaze me how many books were printed in the eighteenth century on the subject of etiquette; for children, apprentices, young men, but mainly for young women and new wives[i]. These books seem to combine instructions for a bewildering variety of different subjects. Dr John Trusler[ii] who had published a book about … Continue reading
The van Aken brothers’ Christmas – Part 1
As Christmas approaches I am wondering how the van Aken brothers, Arnold, Joseph and Alexander, would have spent the Holy day; what rituals and traditions were typical in the first half of the eighteenth century. I know that the glorious, highly decorated evergreen trees lit by tiny twinkling candles, families gathered around roaring fires and … Continue reading
Writing About Other People’s Families
I am writing about the life of the three Van Aken brothers who travelled from Antwerp to London to make a living as artists. The first evidence of their work is an engraving of a portrait by Arnold dated 1718 recorded in the Heinz Archive at National Portrait Gallery, London. The next is a painting … Continue reading