Biography

Netherlandish engraver, part of a family of printmakers from Deventer. The members of the family were Joannes, Lucas, Baptista and Joannes the Younger.

The brothers Joannes and Lucas left Deventer for Antwerp, where they worked for the great publishers Hieronymus Cock and Gerard de Jode. They etched landscapes after Pieter Bruegel the Elder and the so-called Master of the Small Landscapes, ornamental designs after Cornelis Floris and Hans Vredeman de Vries, maps for Cock, De Jode and Abraham Ortelius etc. The Van Doetecum brothers had developed a special technique of etching, so closely resembling the quality of engraving that their prints have been frequently described as engravings. Contemporaries most valued their technique through which the Van Doetecums were able, with a minimum of effort, to imitate engraving and to produce a smooth gradation of tone. Until recent times art historians paid little attention to the brothers who were considered 'reproduction engravers', but since recent studies they are considered to be original and important graphic artists. After the death of Lucas in the early eighties of the sixteenth century Joannes returned to the northern Netherlands, where he then worked with his sons Joannes the Younger and Baptista.

Joannes engraved important maps, such as the sea charts for Lucas Waghenaer's Spieghel and Thresoor der Zeevaert and the maps after Petrus Plancius, which were so important to the Dutch explorers. The Van Doetecum family also made the illustrations for the famous itineraries of Jan Huygen van Linschoten, Gerrit de Veer and Olivier van Noort. Moreover the Van Doetecums built up an important own stock of maps, history prints and art prints. In his native town Deventer Joannes made some highly interesting anti-catholic prints.