Gerardus van Velde, or Geer van Velde (5 April 1898 Lisse

Lisse

Lisse is a town and municipality in the western Netherlands, in the province of South Holland. The municipality covers an area of 16.11 km² of which 0.41 km² is water. Its population is 21864...

 - 5 March 1977, Cachan

Cachan

Cachan is a commune in the southern suburbs of Paris, France. It is located from the center of Paris.The prestigious École Normale Supérieure de Cachan is located there.-Name:...

, Paris

Paris

Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

) was a Dutch painter.

Early life

Van Velde was the second son of Willem Adriaan van Velde, then owner of a small case of inland waterway transport fuelwood and charcoal on the Rhine and Hendrika Catharina von der Voorst, illegitimate daughter of an earl. Catharina and her four children (Neeltje, Bram, Geer, and Jacoba

Jacoba van Velde

Jacoba van Velde was a Dutch writer. Her novel debut "De grote zaal" appeared in 1953 and was within ten years translated into thirteen languages. During her life around 75,000 copies of "De grote zaal" were sold...

) were abandoned by Willem Adriaan after the bankruptcy of his business, leaving them in misery. Moving a lot, they eventually moved to The Hague

The Hague

The Hague is the capital city of the province of South Holland in the Netherlands. With a population of 500,000 inhabitants , it is the third largest city of the Netherlands, after Amsterdam and Rotterdam...

 in 1903. In 1910 at the age of twelve, Geer became an apprentice designer in the firm with Schaijk & Eduard H. Kramers. Kramers encouraged Geer to develop his interest in painting, as he did with his brother Bram van Velde

Bram van Velde

Bram van Velde was a Dutch painter known for an intensely colored and geometric semi-representational painting style related to Tachisme, and Lyrical Abstraction...

.