Frans Banninck Cocq was a member of the aristocratic city government of Amsterdam, where he held a variety of positions from 1632. He became known as the Captain of the Shooting Company on Rembrandt's The Night Watch (1642). Banninck Cocq created a family album consisting of watercolours and coloured drawings. He also had several portraits made of himself and his family and underlined his status with the ostentatious decoration of his houses. Banninck Cocq was therefore an important patron of artists in Amsterdam. Since 1996, the city of Amsterdam has awarded the Frans Banninck Cocq Medal annually to prize winners who have been involved in cultural or social activities for at least ten years. It is not known which painter executed the portrait of Banninck Cocq exhibited in the Uffizi and how it came into the collection.