CORNELIS VERBEECK, CALLED SMIT

Beach view with a fish auction near Egmond aan Zee

The marine painter Cornelis Verbeeck was raised in Haarlem, where he joined the local Guild of St. Luke around 1610. The notorious painter, Rosicrusian and erotomaniac Johannes Torrentius (Verbeek) was his cousin. Cornelis was as well of disputable reputation; he often got in conflict with the lawduring his youth. His aggressive nature is preserved in the alyas ‘Smit’, deriving from the Dutch word for fighting.

Verbeeck had – in agreement with his own nature – a preference for depicting ships in tempest. Apart from such fantastic images he painted some topographically correct beach views of the kind of the present painting. On the beach some Derper fishermen are busy unloading a catch. According to legend, pinks found their origin in Egmond aan Zee around 1400. The church of Egmond aan Zee with its conspicious tower was demolished during the Christmas flood of November 1741.