Background
Jean-Baptiste Pierre Coclers was born in Maastricht in 1696.
Jean-Baptiste Pierre Coclers was born in Maastricht in 1696.
From 1713 till 1729 he studied in Rome with Sebastiano Conca and Marco Benefial, and worked together with the landscape painter Giovanni Niccolò Servandoni.
He was the son and pupil of the Liège painter Philippe Coclers who then lived in Maastricht but in 1702 moved back to Liège. After his Italian years, Coclers worked some time in Marseille (1729-1731), where he painted a large fresco in the bourse (destroyed). From 1731 till 1738 he worked in Maastricht, after which he established himself in Liège, where he was made court painter of the prince-bishops Georges-Louis de Berghes, John Theodore of Bavaria and Charles-Nicolas d"Oultremont.
Jean-Baptiste Coclers died in 1772 as a wealthy man and a painter with a big reputation.
After his death however, his reputation declined rapidly. A second son, Philippe Henri Coclers van Wyck, established himself as a painter in Marseille and became director of the art academy there.