VOET, Alexander, the Elder

Flemish engraver and publisher. He was one of the leading engravers and publishers in Antwerp in the middle and second half of the 17th century. He operated a large workshop in which sixty to seventy collaborators took care of the entire process of printmaking, printing and publishing.

Many works that name him as the author were produced by assistants in his workshop rather than Voet himself. There is also some confusion as to whether certain works are to be attributed to Alexander Voet the Elder or his son Alexander the Younger.

Alexander Voet was active as a reproductive artist who made prints after the works of contemporary Antwerp masters such as Rubens, van Dyck, Erasmus Quellinus the Younger, Cornelis de Vos and others. An example is the Card Players, an engraving after Cornelis de Vos’s original which is now in the Nationalmuseum in Stockholm.