Biography

Dutch marine painter. His father came from Ghent in Flanders. Jacob Bellevois married in 1643 in Rotterdam; the couple had 4 children, but they lost them all. His wife died in 1652. Bellevois remarried in Rotterdam in 1656. The couple was recorded the same year as living in Gouda. They had 2 boys. His second wife died in 1670. Bellevois was in Gouda again in 1671 and he visited Hamburg in 1673-74.

Nothing is known about his training but his monochrome paintings of vessels in a calm sea indicate the influence of Jan Porcellis, the local artist from Rotterdam of great repute, and of his son Julius Porcellis. His stormy seas are influenced by Simon de Vlieger, who stayed for some time in Rotterdam, but who died already in 1653. There are some 200 paintings known by Bellevois.