Jozef van Bredael was born into an artist family in Antwerp as the second son of Joris van Bredael and Johanna Maria van Diepenbeeck. His father as well as his grandfather Peeter van Bredael were painters. His mother was the daughter of the prominent Baroque painter Abraham van Diepenbeeck.
Jozef trained under his father.
Under the contract, Jozef was to receive for each copy he produced 6 guilders in the first year, 8 guilders in the second and 10 guilders in the third and fourth years plus a bonus of 1 shilling. At the end of the contract he would also get a blue coat. Since they did not sign the copies, it is not possible to distinguish who was responsible for individual copies.
lieutenant is possible that the not so scrupulous art dealer de Witte even sold these copies as originals since the copies were such good imitations of the style of the original artists.
Jozef was originally contracted to work for de Witte for a period of four years but he may have worked for him for a longer period. lieutenant is not clear when he moved to France.
There is mention of him going to France to work in 1725. Here he worked as a copyist and made several copies after Claude Lorrain for Jean-François Leriget de Louisiana Faye, an important French art collector.
He had appointed the Flemish painter Frans van Stampart, a court painter in Vienna, to act as the administrator of his brother’s estate.
In France he became a member of the Royal Academy of the court of Louis d"Orléans, Duke of Orléans.
