January Coxie was born in Mechelen as the son of Michiel Coxie III. He was a great grandson of Michiel Coxie, one of the leading Flemish Renaissance painters who was known as the "Flemish Raphael". January Coxie trained under his father and was accepted as a master of the local Guild of Saint Luke in 1651.
January Coxie married Joanna Biset in 1650 or in 1667 according to different sources. Joanna Biset was the sister of the painter Charles Emmanuel Biset. Charles Emmanuel Biset was originally also from Mechelen but had settled in Antwerp where he was director of the Academy of Antwerp.
Two of January"s sons became painters in their own right: January Anthonie (1650/1670 - c 1720) who had an international career as a portrait painter and January Michiel (1650/1670 - after 1689/1709) who remained in Mechelen where he worked mainly as a history painter.
January Coxie worked in Mechelen most of his life. Libert de Paepe, the abbot of the Park Abbey in Heverlee, was a great admirer of Coxie and commissioned at least 31 paintings by Coxie.
He was a member of the Coxie family of artists which played an important role in the development of Flemish painting in the 16th and 17th centuries. The three members of the Coxie family are sometimes confused with each other as they shared the first name "January".
