brawny musclemen, violent drama, wild fantasy and a heightened richness of detail. The dissemination of the engravings of Goltzius went hand in hand with the new practice of art theorisation that was new to the 16th century and in which Karel van Mander played an important role. He received budding artists in his home for evenings of communal drawing and study of classical mythology. After the iconoclasm of the Calvinists, religious themes had gone out of fashion and mythology had become popular. However, few painters could afford a trip to Italy such as the one that van Mander had undertaken. His purpose was to educate young painters in the proper artistic techniques. He was a firm believer in the hierarchy of genres. It was his firm belief that only through proper study of existing works it was possible to realize true-to-life historical allegories. His own works included mannerist mythological subjects, but also portraits and genre paintings influenced by Pieter Bruegel the Elder, such as the Kermis in the Hermitage Museum. Relatively few paintings by him survive. Writings As a writer van Mander worked in various genres: drama, poetry, songs, biography and art theory. He also translated classical literature. His literary production reflects the two sides of his intellectual and spiritual interests: the humanism of the Renaissance and the religious convictions of a pious mennonite. His earliest works were biblical plays that he wrote while still in Flanders. These have not been preserved. His first spiritual writings are contained in De Gulden Harpe, published in 1597. This poetry volume consists of rather longwinded versification of biblical stories that were intended to educate readers with biblical words. His style developed under the influence of his translation (from the French) of classical literature such as the Iliad and, in particular, the Bucolica en Georgica of Virgil. He abandoned the heavy style of the rhetoricians for the jambs of Virgil in his bundle of spiritual songs published in 1613 after his death under the title Bethlehem dat is het Broodhuys. Schilder-boeck Karel van Mander's Schilder-boeck, written in 17th century Dutch and published in Haarlem in 1604 by Passchier van Wesbusch, describes the life and work of more than 250 painters, both historical and contemporary, and explains contemporary art theory for aspiring painters. During his travels and stay in Italy, van Mander had read and was influenced by Giorgio Vasari's famous biographical accounts of painters