HOGENBERG, Flemish family of artists

Nicolaas Hogenberg worked in Mechelen for most of his career, producing prints with religious and historical subjects. His son Remigius Hogenberg (c. 1536-c. 1588) worked as an engraver. In 1570 Remigius executed a View of Münster, which suggests a visit to that city, but by 1573 he was in the service of the Archbishop of Canterbury, Matthew Parker, whose portrait he engraved in the same year. He worked on the Genealogy of English and French Kings (1574) for Parker and produced a number of maps of English counties for Christopher Saxton's Atlas of England and Wales (1579). The existence of several portraits of Huguenot nobles (e.g. Charles, Duc de Lorraine) indicates a possible visit to France. Frans Hogenberg, also Nicolaas's son, worked mainly in England and Germany and is noted for his Civitates orbis terrarum, an atlas containing maps of Europe. Frans Hogenberg's two sons, Johann [Hans] Hogenberg (active 1594-1614) and Abraham Hogenberg (active 1608-after 1653), were both engravers. Johann worked in Mechelen and Cologne, mainly as a portrait engraver, but he produced a few religious subjects and a series of 12 plates depicting birds and animals. Abraham Hogenberg assisted his father with the plates for Abraham Ortelius's Theatrum orbis terrarum (Antwerp, 1570) and designed and engraved frontispieces for booksellers, possibly also working in Cologne.