Jan Frans van Douven

In 1682 a young painter from Roermond, in what was then the Spanish Netherlands, arrived at the court of Düsseldorf to work for Johann Wilhelm, Elector Palatine, a German prince and keen collector. Jan Frans van Douven would stay in his service for the rest of his life and helped build the elector's celebrated picture gallery.

His main job was portraits. He painted the elector again and again, along with his second wife, Anna Maria Luisa de' Medici, the last of the Florentine Medici line. When she was widowed she returned to Florence, and it was she who left the whole Medici collection to the city on condition that it never leave Tuscany. That connection is why van Douven's double portrait of the couple now hangs in the Uffizi.

He travelled as well, following the elector to Vienna to portray the emperor and empress, and painting sitters such as the violinist and composer Arcangelo Corelli. He died at Düsseldorf in 1727.