Marcus Gheeraerts

Marcus Gheeraerts, also spelled Gerards or Geerards, was a Flemish artist who worked at the Tudor court and is widely regarded as "the most significant artist of quality to work in England in large-scale between Eworth and van Dyck". He was brought to England as a child by his father, Marcus Gheeraerts the Elder, who was also a painter.

Gheeraerts gained popularity as a portraitist in the last years of Elizabeth I's reign, thanks to the support of Sir Henry Lee, her champion and pageant-master. He revolutionized English court painting by capturing the essence of his subjects through meticulous observation. He later became a favorite portraitist of James I's queen, Anne of Denmark, but fell out of fashion in the late 1610s.