The Later Years 1627 – 1640 - The Hélène Fourment Years
In 1627 Rubens had a new idea for making money. He wanted to work with engraving and be able to produce less expensive copies of his works. He worked on this with Christopher Jegher, a man referred to him by Moretus. Also during this time, Rubens made many designs for items like gold and silver bowls and cup and ivory statuettes.
A new political matter that bothered Rubens was the new Bishops of Antwerp. The Jesuits of Flanders had
several humanist bishops die and they were replaced by archconservatives. It drove many Antwerp men to Holland. The bishops forced all people to be Catholic and to attend mass every two Sundays out of three.
Rubens would soon throw himself into his work, both artistic and diplomatic again. He was instrumental in the peace accords between England and Spain. Spain had wanted to force the English to change to Catholicism. However, Archduchess Isabella refused to join in that proposed holy war and King Philip IV knew he could not win without the aid of The Netherlands. This peace would not last after the assassination of the Duke of Buckingham, the suspect in England at the time being that the assassin was in the pay of Spain. He would then travel to England where he attempted to persuade the English to sign a new treaty of friendship, but the French Chateauneuf attempted to thwart this at every turn. It wasn’t until early 1630 that the Spanish ambassador finally showed up and this was accomplished. Rubens also painted during this time, doing commissioned works for the King of England like “Allegory of War and Peace” and “St. George and the Dragon.” Upon his departure, Rubens was made a baronet, a gift from King Charles.
Rubens began the Henri IV series, completing the paintings “Triumphal Entry of Henri IV into Paris” and “The Battle of Ivry.” Two sketches for future paintings still exist, “Henri IV in Battle” and “Henri IV at the Battle of St. Martin l’Eglise.” After notifying the French of his work he finally received word that the French were under no obligation to buy his paintings. Rubens did get to save face a little from this though, when he fulfilled an earlier contracted for Louis XIII, twelve tapestry cartoons depicting “The Life of Constantine.” The king was forced to pay, although he made a small attempt to wiggle out of payment. In this year Rubens added yet another honor to his collection, he became Secretary of the Privy Council of the Netherlands. It required no work, but paid him three thousand gold crowns a year. His oldest son would inherit this along with his English title.
In 1630 he married his niece, the daughter of his wife’s sister. Her name was Hélène Fourment and she was 16. Her father, although he may have been surprised, gave his consent and she had no dowry. There were many critics of their marriage, many people disliking the idea of a 53-year-old man marrying a woman less than a third his age who happened to be the same age as his oldest son. They were happy for the rest of his life, though, and she bore him five children: Claire-Jeanne, Francois, Isabella- Hélène, Peter Paul, and Constance-Albertine. She posed for many of the paintings using a female figure in the last 10 years of his life and work.
Soon there was a problem in France that needed attending to. The Queen Mother, Marie de’ Medici had a falling out with Cardinal Richelieu. Marie plotted his downfall, but it was found out and troops surrounded her in her Palais du Luxembourg, but did not enter to retrieve her. The Queen Mother sent a letter out to Archduchess Isabella requesting that Rubens come and take her into exile in The Netherlands. Isabella considered it her duty to help and requested that Rubens go as ambassador. Rubens accepted despite her poor treatment of him and escorted her to The Netherlands after two weeks of talks with Cardinal Richelieu.
However, Rubens’ good luck could not go on forever. In 1631, Archduchess Isabella aging, the Spanish launched an attack on the Netherlands. Thankfully the Dutch army stepped in and fought the Spanish. The regent authorized a peace meeting with Peter Paul Rubens as the principal negotiator. However, when he went to sort out the probelm, the Dutch army would not grant him a safe-conduct pass to get to The Hague. The Dutch feared that he was an agent of Madrid and would not be fair in the negotiations and would not accept him. He was snubbed in Antwerp as the reason the war was continuing. After this, Rubens would give up his life as an ambassador and worked solely as a painter.
In 1633 he bought a new house, Het Stein, in the town of Elewijt, near Brussels. In a way he was running away from Antwerp, but he did not know what other choice he had. He did not want his family to have problems in town because of the people’s misconception.
Although he turned down multiple job offerings as a diplomat, he did accept a huge commission from Philip IV. The king wanted 110 paintings down for his Torre de la Parada. Rubens accepted the commission on the condition that he could have other Flemish painters work with him. He guaranteed that it would all be in his style and it would come together as a harmonious whole. The king accepted. Problems emerged during the progress of this task, though. Rubens suffered terrible rheumatism. Also, he had called many of his previous apprentices. These men were at this point, masters and chafed at the close supervision and the other men. The work was completed, though. After this, Rubens stopped taking commissions or selling his landscapes for a while. He even denied a request made by Kind Charles because of his poor health, although he continued to work for himself whenever he could.
His rheumatism turned into rheumatic gout in 1637 and it disabled him intermittently until his death and he was forced to stop work even for his closest friends. However, he did do some great works for himself during this period. Examples are “The Judgment of Paris” and “Offering to Venus.” Also from this time is “The Evils of War,” done for a fellow artist, Sustermans. Anoter work he did was for the Convent of Mala Strana, because he did not have the heart to refuse them. His final commission was for Philip IV, but the two paintings he actually painted for the king are gone, one simply vanished and another destroyed in a fire. On May 30, 1640, Peter Paul Rubens died.