A Space of Their Own

Adriana Spilberg

May 12, 1650 – ca. 1700

Active in: Germany
Alternate names: Adriana Breekvelt-Spielberg; Adriana Breekvelt-Spilberg; Adriana van der Neer-Spielberg; Adriana van der Neer-Spilberg; Adriana Spielberg; Adriana Breekvelt-Spielberg

Biography

Adriana Spilberg was a Dutch Golden Age painter. She likely learned how to paint from her father, Johannes Spilberg, who was also a painter. In 1684, she married Wilhelm Breekvelt. Much of her active career was spent at the court in Düsseldorf. She died in 1700.

Selected Works

A light-skinned woman with curled brown hair is seated leaning against a table on one elbow. She wears a dress with a black bodice, red skirt, and white sleeves, and has a pearl necklace and earrings. She is playing with of the many bracelets on her wrists and looking directly at the viewer.

Adriana Spilberg, Portrait of a Woman, Sitting at a Table with a Watch, ca. 1675. Oil on canvas, 84 x 78 cm. Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands Art Collection

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Selected works
 

Circle

Daughter of
Johannes Spilberg

Bibliography

Courtauld Institute of Art. A Checklist of Painters ca. 1200–1976 represented in the Witt Library, Courtauld Institute of Art, London. London: Mansell, 1978.

Dabbs, Julia K. Life Stories of Women Artists, 1550–1800: An Anthology. Burlington: Ashgate, 2009.

Gerson, Horst. Ausbreitung und Nachwirkung der holländischen Malerei des 17. Jahrhunderts. Amsterdam: B. M. Israel, 1983.

Greer, Germaine. The Obstacle Race: The Fortunes of Women Painters and Their Work. New York: Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 1979.

Horn, Hendrik J. The Golden Age Revisited: Arnold Houbraken’s Great Theatre of Netherlandish Painters and Paintresses. Doornspijk: Davaco, 2000.

Houbraken, Arnold. De groote schouburgh der Nederlantsche konstschilders en schilderessen…zijnde een vervolg op het schilderboek van K. van Mander. ‘sGravenhage: Houwbraken, 1718.

Klarenbeek, Hanna. Penseelprinsessen & broodschilderessen: vrouwen in de beeldende kunst 1808–1913. Bussum: Thoth, 2012.

Kloek, Els, Catherine Peters Sengers, and Esther Tobé. Lexicon van Noord-Nederlandse kunstenaressen, circa 1550–1800. Hilversum: Verloren, 1998.

Oxford Art Online. “Spilberg, Adriana.” https://doi-org.proxyiub.uits.iu.edu/10.1093/benz/9780199773787.article.B00173516.

RKD. “Adriana Spilberg.” https://rkd.nl/explore/artists/74330.

Russell, Margarita. “The Women Painters in Houbraken’s Groote Schouburgh.” Women’s Art Journal 2 (1981): 8.

Thieme, Ulrich, and Felix Becker. Allgemeines Lexikon der bildenden Künstler: von der Antike bis zur Gegenwart. Leipzig: Seemann, 1907–50.