Quentin Matsys

Quentin Matsys, also written Massys, was born in Leuven and is said to have trained as a blacksmith before turning to painting. Working in Antwerp for more than twenty years, he founded the city’s school of painting, joining Netherlandish tradition to new ideas from Italy and to moralising, sometimes satirical, subjects. His Moneylender and his Wife is in the Louvre. The National Gallery in London holds his grotesque An Old Woman, often called The Ugly Duchess.