Philippe de Champaigne trained first in his native Brussels with Jean Bouillon and the portraitist Michel de Bordeau before entering the studio of the landscape painter Jacques Fouquieres in 1620. He followed Fouquieres to Paris in 1621, working in the studio of Georges Lallemant (1580-1636), a painter of the late Fontainebleau school.

Under the supervision of Nicolas Duchesne (d. 1628) in 1625, Champaigne collaborated with Nicolas Poussin (1594-1665) on decorations for the Luxembourg Palace, the residence of the queen mother, Marie de' Medici (1573-1642). Champaigne married Duchesne's daughter Charlotte after returning to Brussels in 1627 and later succeeded Duchesne as painter to the queen mother, for whom he decorated the church o...