Michiel Sweerts
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Michiel Sweerts (September 29, 1618 - 1664) (also known as Michael Sweerts was a Flemish painter of the Baroque period, active in Rome (1645-1656) in the style of the Bamboccianti. The Bamboccianti were known for depicting genre scenes of daily life.
Born in Brussels, he arrived in Rome in the mid 1640s, and rapidly moved into the circle of Flemish painters that had arrayed around Pieter van Laer, and that resided near Santa Maria del Popolo. In 1647, he attended meetings of the Accademia di San Luca, although not as a member. By 1659, he had returned to Brussels, where he joined th painter's guild.
He appears to have become mentally unstable in his last years. In Amsterdam, he joined a missionary group, and sailed from Marsaille to the Orient. Travelling to Jerusalem, and from there to Goa, where after causing tribulations to those around him, he died.
Sweerts is a enigmatic and difficult artist to categorize, since he seems to have absorbed a variety of influences to create a eclectic hybrid that can be described as a Netherlandish genre adaptation of an early tenebrist styles: a blend of Vermeer painting genre and Caravaggio-influenced full bodied figures.
