First years

The young painter held his first exhibition in the spring of 1917. Critics disliked his "old-fashioned" style, but he did sell a few pieces. With the proceeds, he bought a studio overlooking the gardens of the Royal Palace and made drawings of the domesticated roe deer belonging to Princess Juliana. His subsequent paintings were well-received by the general public for their rural themes, but critics panned them, labeling the painter mediocre. To supplement his income, van Meegeen painted portraits for tourists vacationing on the French Riviera.

By 1925, he was already a well-known artist, but critics continued to reproach him for his resemblance to the great masters of the 17th century, calling him an imitator and lacking in creativity. At that time, Cubism and Surrealism were dominating the art world. Fed up with the negative reviews, van Meegeen had the ill-advised idea of ​​criticizing his detractors in the local newspapers, calling them snobs and ignorant. Since the critics had the final say, they rejected his paintings even more.

From 1930 onwards, van Meegeren disappeared from the art scene and decided to make a mockery of the criticism he'd received: if they said he painted like the Masters of old, that's what he'd give them.

He shut himself away in his studio and began studying painters who had already passed away, researching their techniques for applying and mixing paint, palette knives and brushes like the ones they used, and buying antique white canvases. His first work from that period was Man and Woman with a Spinet, an imitation of The Music Lesson by Johannes van der Meer. He hadn't wanted to sell it because he considered it too crude, but a banker bought it as if it were an authentic work.