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Updated: May 29, 2025
At the age of twenty, Vandyck set out for Italy, but delayed some time at Brussels, fascinated by the charms of a peasant girl of Saveltheim, named Anna van Ophem, who persuaded him to paint two pictures for the church of her native place a St. Martin on horseback, painted from himself and the horse given him by Rubens; and a Holy Family, for which the girl and her parents were the models.
"With Italy with Italy I can win all!" he kept repeating to himself as he turned his horse's head to the South. The first day's ride took the artistic traveler to the little village of Saventhem, five miles from Brussels. Here he turned aside long enough to say good-by to a fair young lady, Anna Van Ophem by name, whom he had met a few months before at Antwerp.
Jean Hoogenbergh, born about 1500, was a successful painter of miniatures; he lived about fifty years. Jean Van Ophem was appointed Civic Engraver of Seals and Gold Worker. He died in 1553. François Verbeek became master workman in 1531, and finally doyen of the craft.
Great was his relief when he returned to Antwerp to hear that the pretty Anna Van Ophem of Saventhem had been married three years before to a worthy wine merchant of Brussels, and was now the proud mother of two handsome boys. Great was the welcome that Van Dyck received at Antwerp; and in it all the gracious Rubens joined.
As Vandyck was on his way from Antwerp to Brussels he halted at the village of Saventhem, where he fell in love with Anna van Ophem, and so stayed on in the lovely valley of Flanders, week after week, as if he had forgotten that Italy existed. Anna persuaded him to paint a picture for the village church, and he executed a Holy Family in which the Virgin was a portrait of Anna, and St.
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