After Gerard van Honthorst

On a museum label, "after" is a precise word. It means the design of a picture belongs to the named painter while the brushwork belongs to someone else, a copyist working from his original. Here the painter is Gerard van Honthorst, also called Gerrit, the Utrecht artist who became court painter to Frederik Hendrik, the prince of Orange who led the Dutch Republic as stadholder.

Honthorst painted the prince and his wife, Amalia of Solms, many times, and his large studio copied those compositions. Such copies usually carry no signature, so the label names the model and leaves the hand anonymous. The Mauritshuis in The Hague uses this formula for a portrait of Frederik Hendrik on panel, one of the copies made in Honthorst's studio.