Paulus Potter is celebrated as one of the most prominent animal painters of the 17th century. Renowned for his exceptional talent, he earned the nickname “the animal painter”. While he started out as a history painter, Potter gained widespread acclaim for his renderings of everyday animals - horses beside fences or bulls in a paddock, often in a sunlit Dutch landscape. Despite passing away at the young age of 28, he managed to leave behind a substantial and impressive body of work. His most famous painting, The Bull, has become an icon of Dutch art history and has been displayed at the Mauritshuis in The Hague since 1822.
Painting in his blood
Potter was born in Enkhuizen in 1625, the son of the painter Pieter Potter. He learned the trade from his father already from an early age. Potter later moved to Delft and The Hague, where he joined the local artists’ guild. This membership, and the fact that he had completed his training, allowed him to accept commissions under his own name. Thanks to his well-connected mother and his later relationship with his father-in-law, Potter quickly established a flourishing career, attracting wealthy clients. Notably, Johan Maurits, after whom the Mauritshuis was named, showed a keen interest in his work and even visited him.
Painter of animals
Paulus Potter had a unique ability to observe and depict animals, capturing the texture of their skin, their posture, and their expressions. He was able to render them in precise detail, such as the tiny flies on a bull’s hide, the moist nose of a cow, and the marks of the shears on a recently shorn sheep. Often painting his subjects from a low vantage point, Potter allowed them to dominate the canvas and stand out against their surroundings. This respectful and detailed portrayal of animals was innovative for his era.
Potter’s Bull
Although contemporary visitors are often drawn to the Mauritshuis for works by Vermeer and Rembrandt, in the 19th century it was Potter’s The Bull that was the crowd-pleaser. Its popularity stemmed from Potter’s decision to paint an everyday farm animal in life size, coupled with his extraordinary attention to detail - the lark in the sky, the sunlight on the meadow, and the cow’s whiskers. These qualities resonated with the 19th-century French realist movement. The museum’s first director, jonkheer Steengracht van Oostcapelle, wrote in the catalogue of 1826 that the painting was “the most perfect imitation of nature possible.”
Most of Potter’s works are small paintings depicting peasant life, making the monumental scale of The Bull - measuring 2.35 by 3.40 metres - all the more remarkable. The painting was originally displayed in the Prince William V Gallery on The Hague’s Buitenhof square. In 1795, French troops seized William V’s collection and transported it to Paris, where The Bull was exhibited in the Louvre (the later Musée Napoléon). The Bull made a deep impression alongside the paintings by Raphael and Titian that the French had brought over from Italy. The painting was recovered by force of arms in 1815 after Napoleon’s defeat and returned to the Netherlands by horse and wagon, and has been on display at the Mauritshuis again since 1822.
Restoration of The Bull
Between 2024 and 2025, The Bull is undergoing restoration at the Mauritshuis. Visitors can watch the restoration process live. Extensive research was conducted before the restoration began. If you are interested in the findings of this research and the work of our conservators, you can visit PotterWatch.
