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(b Oudewater, nr. Gouda, ?c.1460; d Bruges, 13 Aug. 1523). Netherlandish painter, active for almost all his career in Bruges; he had settled there by 1484, when he became a member of the painters' guild, and after the death of Memlinc in 1494 he became the city's leading painter. At this time the economic importance of Bruges was declining, but it still maintained its prestige as a centre of art and David played an important role in the flourishing export trade in paintings that it developed in the first quarter of the 16th century. Late in his career he probably also ran a workshop in Antwerp (he is thought to be the ‘Meester Gheraert van Brugghe’ who became a master in the painters' guild there in 1515). His work—extremely accomplished, but conservative and usually rather bland—was very popular and his stately compositions were copied again and again.

Text source: The Oxford Dictionary of Art and Artists (Oxford University Press)


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