RKD STUDIES

Anthonie van BORSSOM

... onto linen; no original tacking edges remain. There is an old crease along the bottom edge. The painting is very worn and has been heavily damaged by over-cleaning at some point in the past, which has removed most of the landscape centre-right and revealed two more cows. These are severely abraded and are thought to have been repainted at some point in the past (possibly by Bourgeois); the red cow is particularly damaged and may still bear some overpaint. On the left there is a pentimento of a large seated figure. A figure in the landscape on the right, to the right of the dog, has also been painted out. The partially removed varnish is very discoloured and distracting – there are remnants along the bottom, particularly in the corners, which are uneven and have noticeable drip marks. Previous recorded treatment: 1911, relined, Holder; 1949–55, partially cleaned, overpaint partially removed, Dr Hell.RELATED WORKS1) Anthonie van Borssom, Cowherd in a Pool, signed AVBorssom fecit, canvas, 103 x 168 cm. Städtische Kunst- und Gemäldesammlung, Bamberg.82) Another signed variant: canvas, 71.5 x 92 cm. Present whereabouts unknown (Christie’s, 9 July 2004, lot 33; Phillips, London, 10 July 2001, lot 111; Dorotheum, Vienna, 30 March 2000, lot 82; Christie’s, New York, 31 Jan. 1997, lot 65; Rothschild coll...

Christoffel van den BERGHE

... 54 (Nov. 8, 2019).EXHIBITIONLondon 1987–8, pp. 24, 64–5, no. 56 (N. Kalinsky; Dutch School; as on canvas).TECHNICAL NOTESSingle-member oak panel which has a general horizontal warp and a vertical bow on the right. A knot in the wood has caused this irregular warp and the paint and ground have blistered, flaked and cracked. The worst area of damage in the right foreground of the painting again corresponds to the knot. The paint film is thin and worn overall. The right side of the sky and the trees are especially abraded; these areas and the worn figures on the right have been retouched. It seem...

... similarities between the New York picture and a pair of small landscapes on copper (Summer Landscape and Winter Landscape) in the Mauritshuis, which are monogrammed ‘CVB’ (Related works, nos. 2a, 2b). Those are more delicate and colourful, but that might be explained by their material (copper) and their very small dimensions. Liedtke also made a comparison with an ice scene in Antwerp by Van den Berghe (Related works, no. 3) [2].Of the works by the other artist mentioned by Jansen, an ice scene attributed to Adam van Breen (Related works, no. 4) [3] comes closest to DPG514 and the New York painting, but the low viewpoint and both the stiffness and the larger scale of the figures suggest another hand.13DPG514 depicts a winter scene in a town or village with richly dressed people, some of whom are skating on the ice. At the far left is a tavern with the sign of a swan – a common indicator of a bordello,14 seen for instance in scenes of the Prodigal Son; in one such image (Related works, no. 5) [4] there is also a wreath, like the two in DPG514, but nothing else seems to indicate that DPG514 illustrates that parable....

Nicolaes BERCHEM

... theim Castle.1Also in the 1650s Berchem began to produce panoramic views painted in bright colours. These reflect the influence of Italianate painters such as Jan Asselijn (c. 1610/15–52) and Jan Both (c. 1615/22–52), and, most significantly, begin to display an idealized Italianate style. They are characterized by warm light, wandering shepherds, towering trees, and occasionally include identifiable landmarks such as the Temple of the Sibyl near Tivoli in Italy, as well as the ruins of the castles of Brederode and Croonenburgh in the Netherlands. He also painted several Mediterranean harbour scenes that contain exotically dressed figures, and Classical sculpture and architecture. Claims that Berchem visited Italy on one or more occasions are not supported by documentary evidence.2In the 1650s and 1660s Berchem moved back and forth between Haarlem and Amsterdam, where he worked for the cartographer Nicolaes Visscher II (1618–79 or 1709), before finally settling in Amsterdam in 1677. During these years...

1.3 The Dulwich collection and its catalogues

... ndt himself.56 In the Rubens entries he was over-cautious, assigning the sketches DPG451 (Venus and Adonis) and DPG40A-B (Four Saints), and the unfinished portrait DPG143 (Katherine Manners (?)), to ‘scholars or imitators’ of Rubens, without suggesting new attributions.57 The 1880 catalogue was re-edited in 1892 and 1905. In the 1892 edition the pictures were renumbered: as a consequence there were now two types of numbers on the frames, the old in black and the new ones in red.58 The Alleyn and Cartwright pictures were now included in the catalogue, at least the ones that were on display.59 Sir Edward Tyas Cook (1857–1919), author of the 1914 catalogue, was also an outsider. His catalogue was re-edited in 1926. He was a journalist, and a Ruskin scholar.60 The 1914 catalogue was in numerical order, with plenty of attention paid to the 18th- and 19th-century writings about the collection, and less to the latest scholarly publications.During the Second World War the pictures were stored for safety with the National Gallery’s paintings in Welsh mines. In the meantime, the building was badly damaged by a bomb in 1944; it was not until 1953 that the reconstructed Gallery re-opened to the public. At that time a handlist was made with 615 numbers, probably at least partly based on the text of the catalogue of an exhibition of 54 Dulwich pictures held in the National Gallery and Leeds in 1947–53. Ludwig Burchard (1886–1960) was responsible for the entries on Rubens and Van Dyck,61 Sir Ellis Waterhouse (1905– 85) on Gainsborough and Hogarth; all the other paintings were dealt with by Anthony Blunt (1907–83)....

... ney. In 1977 another auction was prepared, in which several paintings regarded as artistically less important would have been offered. Some paintings from the Cartwright collection were in mind. But the auction did not take place, mainly because opposing force...

... ndt’s Girl (DPG163) much attention was paid to the later appreciation reflected in copies and prints.68 The Polish connection was studied twice.69 The Gallery has organized a continuous programme of conservation projects to improve the technical quality of the pictures and their frames.70 Consequently the condition of both is gratifyingly high, certainly compared with British galleries of the same size....

Peter Paul Rubens DPG143

... rso has white gesso priming, painted brown, and there are traces of a rough drawing beneath, which can be made out slightly more clearly in UV: it appears to depict a female figure. It is unclear whether the verso sketch is by Rubens.382 There is a thin, broadly applied grey imprimatura, typical of Rubens, applied over the chalk ground on the front of the panel. In places (such as the face, the hair and the ribboned sleeves) the paint surface is detailed and highly worked, but the cuffs and the proper right hand are sketchy, broadly painted and unfinished. The reserve, left when the red background was painted, can be seen at the edge of the proper right cuff. The collar may also be unfinished but it is painted in more detail than the cuffs. There seems to be slight abrasion of the black passages and around the sitter’s waist. The mauve dress and ribbons have faded, probably due to the discolouration of a light-sensitive lake pigment: a strip along the bottom, which has been protected by the frame rebate, remains closer to the original shade. Previous recorded treatment: 1871, ‘revived’, varnished and frame regilded; 1931, frame paraffined to treat for woodworm; 1935, frame paraffined; 2004, conserved, S. Plender.RELATED WORKS1a) (Preparatory (?) drawing for the face) Peter Paul Rubens, Katherine Manners, Duchess of Buckingham, c. 1625 or c. 1629, inscribed in red chalk in another, 17th-century, hand: Hertoginne van Bockengem P.P. Rubbens f., black and red chalk, heightened with white bodycolour, 368 x 265 mm. Albertina, Vienna, 8257 [1].3831b.I) (pendant of 1a?) Peter Paul Rubens, George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, c. 1625, inscribed in red chalk in another hand: hertoeg van bockengem P.P Rubbens. ft, black and red chalk, heightened with white bodycolour, 383 x 266 mm. Albertina, Vienna, 8256 [2].3841b.II) (after 1b.I) Peter Paul Rubens, Portrait of George Villiers (1592–1628), Duke of Buckingham, c. 1625, canvas, 60.9 x 47.3 cm. Pollok House, Glasgow, PC.49.3851b.III) (pair of 1b.IV?) Studio of or copy after Peter Paul Rubens, George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, after 1625, panel, 63 x 48 cm. Palazzo Pitti, Florence, 324.3861b.IV) (pair of 1b.III?) Studio of or copy after Peter Paul Rubens, Portrait of a Lady (Katherine Manners?), panel, 64 x 46 cm. Palazzo Pitti, Florence, 1890 note 761.3872) (possible pair of DPG143) English School, 17th century, George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, panel, 78 x 62 cm. Collection Earl of Jersey.388(Other) portraits of Katherine (Catherine) Manners3a) Gerard van Honthorst, George Villiers, 1st Duke of Buckingham with his Family, 1628 (?), canvas, 132.5 x 192.8 cm. Royal Collection Trust, RCIN 406553 [3].3893b) Attributed to Henri Beaubrun, Lady Katherine Manners, Widow of George Villiers, 1st Duke of Buckingham, c. 1628–32, canvas, 59.7 x 48.9 cm. Present whereabouts unknown (Philip Mould Ltd, London, 2010s).3903c) Anthony van Dyck, Katherine, Duchess of Buckingham with her Children, Mary, George and Francis Villiers, c. 1633, canvas, 234.6 x 182.6 cm. Rubenshuis, Antwerp, RH.S.188.3913d) Anthony van Dyck, Katherine, Duchess of Buckingham, later Countess, and ultimately Marchioness, of Antrim as Widow, c. 1633, canvas, 74 x 57.5 cm. The Duke of Rutland collection, Belvoir Castle, Leicestershire.3923e) Anthony van Dyck, Katherine, Duchess of Buckingham, later Countess, and ultimately Marchioness, of Antrim, before April 1635, canvas, 219.7 x 132.7 cm (including an early addition at the ...

... aughter of Maria de’ Medici and Henri IV, bride-to-be of King Charles I, back with him to London. He commissioned from Rubens not only the drawings of himself and Katherine Manners (?) which were the basis of the pictures, but also other works of art glorifying himself.408 In 1627 Rubens sold Buckingham his collection of antiquities, which he had acquired from Dudley Carleton (1573–1632) in 1618.409Grossmann in 1957 suggested that DPG143 might have been painted in Paris in 1625, but based on a portrait by Balthazar Gerbier d’Ouvilly (1591/3–1663). It is indeed conceivable that the Duke commissioned Rubens to produce a portrait of the Duchess for which he gave him as model a miniature he had brought with him to Paris: this would explain the supposed lack of fidelity to Katherine Manners’ features.According to Michael Jaffé, DPG143 depicts a woman in court dress, which was according to him ‘high Parisian mode’,410 but it should be noted that alternating dark and white slashed sleeves were also popular in England in the 1620s, as shown in several portraits from that period. Interestingly, the costume with its sleeves and jewellery is similar to those in two other portraits which must have been painted in France: Anne of Austria, Queen of France, to be dated c. 1625 (1601–66; Related works, no. 4c), and Madame de Vicq, dated 1625 (Tel Aviv Museum of Art; Related works, no. 4d) [5]. The subject could therefore be not Katherine Manners but a French lady-in-waiting, as some authors suggest.411 However, Bianca du Mortier has commented that the jewellery in DPG143 shows that the lady was excessively rich, which would point in the direction of Katherine Manners, who was at the time the richest woman in England.412Some scholars have assumed that the black rosette was a sign of mourning, and that the lady was a widow at the time.413 If she were Katherine Manners, that would have been after the assassination of Buckingham in 1628. However black jewels were not a sign of mourning in the 17th century (memento mori pieces and pearls would have been worn instead),414 and, although the dress in DPG143 would have been a perfect example of half-mourning in the 19th century, in the 17th century a mourning dress would have been completely black, and the hair would have been covered.415In conclusion, because of the similarity with Venus and Adonis in the Van Dyck picture, it is tempting to think that the lady in DPG143 is Katherine Manners. We would still need to explain why she looks in the same direction as her husband (in the drawings in Vienna), why the picture was left unfinished, and why Rubens seems to have kept it in his studio. The strongest counter-argument is that she looks much older than a twenty-two-year-old, if she was born around 1603, but that is also not certain.Sir George Scharf, who in 1857 became Secretary of the National Portrait Gallery, and later its Director, on one of his many tours around the British Isles sketched some of the portraits in the Dulwich Gallery. In 1859 he drew three paintings that were thought to be by Rubens, DPG285, DPG290 and DPG143. The remarks he made next to his drawing of DPG143 relate to colours, and not to the sitter [6]....

Peter Paul Rubens DPG131

... brittle blisters at the top, and a diagonal scratch below her proper right shin; the old restoration of these scratches now appears slightly dark. Three fairly small cracks can be seen at the right panel edge in the hill and there is some raised craquelure and old paint loss in the nearby sky, towards the top right corner. The hill is very thinly painted and slightly abraded. No records of previous treatments exist for this painting.RELATED WORKS1) Copy (in reverse): Frans de Roy, Hagar with her Son in the Wilderness, c. 1758, inscriptions P.P. Rubbens Pinxit and F.DeRoij Fecit Aqua forti, etching, 272 x 215 mm (image). Koninklijke Bibliotheek van België, Brussels, S.I 27821 [2].512Similar young women2a) Study for 2c: Peter Paul Rubens, Seated Young Woman with Raised Arms, c. 1630–34, black and red chalk, with heightening in white, 423 x 500 mm. Staatliche Museen, Berlin, KdZ 4003.5132b) Study for 2c: Peter Paul Rubens, Kneeling Young Woman, c. 1630–34, black and red chalk, with heightening in white, pen in brown, 508 x 458 mm. Département des arts graphiques, Louvre, Paris, 20.194 (recto).5142c) Peter Paul Rubens, The Garden of Love, c. 1630–35, canvas, 199 x 286 cm. Prado, Madrid, P-1690 [3].5153) Peter Paul Rubens, Study of a Young Woman (Hélène Fourment?), early 1630s, black, red and white chalk, 320 x 405 mm. Albertina, Vienna, 8255.5164) Anonymous artist in the circle of Peter Paul Rubens, Allegory of Music, panel, 18.5 x 28 cm. Louvre, Paris, RF 1985–24.5175a) Peter Paul Rubens, Study for a Portrait of a Family (Peter Paul Rubens and Hélène Fourment, with Nicolas and Clara Johanna Rubens), panel, 35.5 x 38.2 cm. Philadelphia Museum of Art (John G. Johnson Collection), J622.5185b) Peter Paul Rubens, Rest on the Flight into Egypt with Saints, 1632–5, panel, 87 x 125 cm. Prado, Madrid, 1640.5195c) Peter Paul Rubens and Christoffel Jegher, Rest on the Flight into Egypt, c. 1633–5, pen and brown ink, retouched by Rubens with brush and black ink, heightened with white and garish white bodycolour, over preliminary drawing in black chalk, on cream-coloured paper, 474 x 615 mm. Fundacja im. Raczyńskich, Museum Narodowe, Poznań, Fr. 396.5205d) Christoffel Jegher after Peter Paul Rubens, Rest on the Flight into Egypt, inscriptions, 1633–6, chiaroscuro woodcut: one line block and one tone block, 466 x 604 mm. BM, London, 1917,1208.559 [4].521Other scenes with Hagar6a) Jan Harmensz. Muller after Harmen Jansz. Muller, Hagar and the Angel, inscriptions, c. 1591, engraving, 175 x 210 mm. BM, London, 1853,0312.1.5226b) Herman van Swanevelt, The Angel consoling Hagar (from a series of four plates), H. Swanevelt Fe Rom. and other inscriptions, etching, sheet 125 (trimmed) x 202 mm. BM, London, S.2219.5236c) Peter Paul Rubens, The Expulsion of Hagar, c. 1615–18, panel, 63 x 76 cm. Hermitage, St Petersburg, GE-475.5246d) Peter Paul Rubens, The Expulsion of Hagar, 1618, panel, 71 x 102 cm. Collection of the Duke of Westminster, Eaton Hall.525Copies7a) Jeremias Wildens inventory: Op de Schilders Camer (In the painter’s room), Antwerp, 30 Dec. 1653, no. 286, Een Aga naer Rubbens (A Hagar after Rubens).5267b) Copy of DPG131: Hagar in the Wilderness, canvas, 24½ x 29¾ in. (c. 62.2 x 75.6 cm). Seena and Arnold Davis collection, Scarsdale, N.Y., in 1980.5277c) Copy: ?Thomas Gainsborough, Hélène Fourment, canvas, 50.5 x 60.9 cm. Present whereabouts unknown (Bonhams sale, 28 March 1974, lot 60; Marshall 1973, pp. 6–8, lot 6).528Distant relative8) Jean-Baptiste Greuze, Le Malheur imprévu (The Broken Mirror), c. 1762–3, canvas, 56 x 45.6 cm. The Wallace Collection, London, P442.529Lent to the RA to be copied in 1902, 1922 and 1930....

... upon which she was delivered of a son, who she named Ishmael. Later the aged Sarah gave birth to Isaac, leading Hagar and Ishmael to be banished to the desert. When Hagar despaired that her son would die of thirst an angel appeared and pointed to a spring, announcing, ‘Arise, lift up the lad, and hold him in thine hand; for I will make him a great nation. And God opened her eyes, and she saw a well of water; and she went, and filled the bottle with water, and gave the lad drink’ (Genesis 21). The empty vessel lies on the ground to the left in DPG131. Galatians 4:22–31 explains that Hagar was a symbol of the old covenant and Sarah of the new. In any case, Hagar fled twice into the wilderness, the first time pregnant and the second time with her son.The scene in DPG131 is not a regular Hagar in the Desert. In the 16th and 17th century Hagar’s second flight into the wilderness would usually have been depicted; consequently the angel would have been prominently present, showing Hagar the water that would save her and her son: see for instance the engraving by Jan Harmensz. Muller (1571–1628; Related works, no. 6a). Ishmael need not be present, but the bottle is necessary, as in the etching by Herman van Swanevelt (c. 1603–55; Related works, no. 6b). The figure in DPG131 is a young lady in contemporary dress, who does not look like a slave who is almost dying of thirst in the wilderness with her young son. The rich attire could indeed suggest a penitent Mary Magdalen, but in that case the saint would be shown differently, not looking at us freely as here. She is not crying, nor has she a red face, as Widauer says.534 The only things that could point to her being Hagar are the vessel and the fact that she is wringing her hands. But there still is the possibility that Ishmael and/or the angel were added later, after the picture had left Rubens’s studio, and then removed again.Rubens had already painted two versions of an earlier part of the story in The Expulsion of Hagar, now in the Hermitage (c. 1615–18) and in the collection of the Duke of Westminster (1618; Related works, nos 6c, 6d), and claimed that the theme was new as a pictorial invention. In the Corpus Rubenianum volume the subject of the pregnant Hagar being dismissed from the house is characterized as a scene of ordinary life.535 It might be possible that in DPG131 Rubens depicted an unusual subject from the story of Hagar, as suggested by Elizabeth McGrath,536 namely the episode when Hagar was pregnant and in the wilderness for the first time, where she was found by an angel by a fountain. That would explain both the strange events surrounding Ishmael and the angel (added by somebody who wanted the more conventional subject from the Hagar story: the second time that Hagar was in the wilderness with her son) and Hagar’s healthy appearance as well as her beautiful dress (the pregnant Hagar herself, proudly, had chosen to flee the hostile house of Sarah and Abraham). Rubens has not depicted a mother worried about her son dying of thirst. The choice of the earlier episode with the pregnant Hagar would indeed be a new subject, and by portraying Hagar in contemporary clothing Rubens made the scene more relevant t...

Peter Paul Rubens DPG264

... The Three Graces, red chalk heightened with white bodycolour, 267 x 170 mm. Courtauld Institute of Art Gallery, London, Princes Gate Bequest, D.1978.PG.66.6749b) Georg Petel, The Three Graces, c. 1620, gilt bronze, 30.5 x 19.7 x 5.2 cm. MFA, Boston, 1976.842.675 (See also Related works, nos 2d.I and III)9c) Peter Paul Rubens, The Three Graces, c. 1620–24, panel, 119 x 99 cm. Gemäldegalerie der Akademie, Vienna, 646 [9].6769d.I) Peter Paul Rubens and Jan Brueghel II, The Three Graces with a Basket of Roses, canvas (originally on panel), 111 x 64 cm. National Museum, Stockholm, NM 601.6779d.II) After Peter Paul Rubens (9d.I), The Three Graces, black chalk, indented for transfer, laid down, 377 x 248 mm. BvB, Rotterdam, MB 5125.6789e) Peter Paul Rubens, Nymphaeum with a Statue of Venus, after 1636, inscribed P. P. Rubens (in another hand), black chalk, pen in grey, brush in brown, 302 x 485 mm (recto). Staatliche Museen, Berlin, KdZ 2234.679Other subjects10) Peter Paul Rubens, The Judgement of Paris, c. 1597–9, panel, 133.9 x 174.5 cm. NG, London, NG6379.68011a) (modello for 11b) Peter Paul Rubens, The Education of Maria de’ Medici, panel, 49.5 x 39.4 cm. Alte Pinakothek, Munich, 92.68111b) Peter Paul Rubens, The Education of Maria de’ Medici (part of the Medici cycle), 1621–5, canvas, 394 x 295 cm. Louvre, Paris, 1771.682Three Graces crowned by Cupids12) Peter Paul Rubens, Three Graces with another Figure, c. 1635, pen and brown ink, over red chalk, on buff paper, 214 x 201 mm. BM, London, 1981,0725.31.68313) Rubens’s Cantoor (Willem Panneels), The Three Graces, 1628–30, Dit is near een Schedts Geteekent Van Wit en Swerdt (This is drawn after a sketch in white and black), pen, brown ink, black and red chalk, 210 x 215 mm. SMK, Copenhagen, Rubens’s Cantoor [10].68414a.I) (bozzetto for 22a; see also 11b) Peter Paul Rubens, The Three Graces, c. 1630, panel, 46.5. x 34.5 cm. Palazzo Pitti, Florence, 1890, no. 1165.68514a.II) Jean Massard after Jean Baptiste Wicar after Peter Paul Rubens (14a.I), The Three Graces, inscriptions, etching and engraving, 270 (trimmed) x 201 mm. BM, London, 1891,0414.872 (part of Mongez 1789–1807).68615a.Ia) Studio of Peter Paul Rubens, Young Women led forward by Putti, c. 1635–7, black and red chalk washed with brown, 282 x 250 mm. University Library, Warsaw, zb.d.1275 (recto).68715a.Ib) (modello of 15a.Ic, grisaille) Peter Paul Rubens, Young Women led forward by Putti, c. 1633–5, panel, 30 x 32 cm. Pinacoteca del Castello Sforzesco, Milan, 1275.68815a.Ic) Peter Paul Rubens, Three Graces, painting, present wherebouts unknown (see 15a.Ia–b; II and III).68915a.II) Remoldus Eynhoudt or Cornelis Schut I after Peter Paul Rubens, Three Graces with Five Cupids, etching, 233 x 253 mm (paper). Teylers Museum, Haarlem, KG 17669 [11].69015a.III) Maria Cosway after Peter Paul Rubens (15a.Ic), Helena Forman conducted to the Temple of Hymen, 1807, inscriptions, etching and aquatint, 348 x 301 mm. BM, London, 1865,0311.177.691Dancing and moving Graces, nymphs, nereids, the Blessed, and peasants16a) Peter Paul Rubens, studies for Groups of the Blessed, point of the brush and brown ink over red chalk, 306 x 415 mm. Private collection, England.69216b) Peter Paul Rubens (?) and Jan Boeckhorst, The Assumption of the Righteous or Blessed, panel, 119 x 93 cm. Alte Pinakothek, Munich, 353.69317a) (modello for 17b) Peter Paul Rubens, The Birth of Venus, c. 1638, panel, 26.5 x 28.3 cm (one of twelve oil sketches for the Torre de la Parada). KMSKB, Brussels, 4106.69417b) Cornelis de Vos, The Birth of Venus, canvas, 187 x 208 cm. Prado, Madrid, 1862.69518) Peter Paul Rubens, Feast of Venus, c. 1636–7, canvas, 217 x 350 cm. Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, 684.69619a) Peter Paul Rubens, Dancing Peasants (recto), Feasting Peasants (verso), c. 1630–32, black chalk and pen and brown ink and a few traces of red chalk (recto), pen and dark brown ink over preliminary drawing in black chalk (verso), 595 x 512 mm. BM, London, 1885,0509.50.69719b) Peter Paul Rubens, Feasting and Dancing Peasants (The Kermesse or The Village Wedding), c. 1630–32, panel, 149 x 261 cm. Louvre, Paris, 1797.69819c) Peter Paul Rubens, Dancing Peasants and Mythological Figures, c. 1630–35, panel, 73 x 106 cm. Prado, Madrid, 1691.69919d) Anonymous Flemish painter after Peter Paul Rubens, Moses, Aaron, and Miriam and other Women celebrate the Crossing of the Red Sea, c. 1635–8, panel 54.5 x 79 cm. Staatliche Kunsthalle, Karlsruhe, 1886.70020) Peter Paul Rubens and Frans Snijders, Diana and her Retinue, surprised by Satyrs, 1639, canvas, 128 x 314 cm. Prado, Madrid, 1665.70121) Copy after (or studio of) Peter Paul Rubens, Silenus with Bacchic Revellers, c. 1625–8, panel, 48.1 x 72 cm. Courtauld Institute of Art Gallery, London, Samuel Courtauld Bequest, P.1948.SC.384 [12].702Gerard van Opstal’s ivories after Rubens22a) Gerard van Opstal after Peter Paul Rubens (14a.I), The Three Graces, ivory relief, present whereabouts unknown, stolen from Musées Royaux d’art et d’histoire, Brussels, 2169.70322b) Attributed to Gerard van Opstal, Silver cup (German) and ivory base with a bacchanal (or the Three Graces?), silver and ivory, total h 50.5 x w 25 cm, base d 14 cm. Museo Nacional de Artes Decorativas, Madrid, CE17828.70422c) Attributed to Gerard van Opstal, Carved ivory tankard sleeve with the Three Graces, ivory and gilt bronze, h 35 cm. Present whereabouts unknown (Yves Saint-Laurent and Pierre Bergé sale, Christie’s, Paris, 23–25 Feb. 2009 (Sale 1209), lot 570.705...

... by Marcantonio Raimondi (Related works, no. 3c) [6]. Raphael made a painting that is clearly based on such Antique statues (Related works, no. 4); he shows the Graces with apples in their hands. Rubens knew those well-known examples and Raphael’s seated Graces in the Loggia of Psyche in the Villa Farnesina in Rome, which were also known through prints (Related works, nos 5a–b). He quoted Raphael’s group quite literally in a painting now in Mertoun House (Related works, no. 5c). He was also drawn to the stucchi of elongated women holding garlands by Francesco Primaticcio (1504–70) in Fontainebleau, as shown in a drawing now in Rotterdam (Related works, no. 6). He had probably not seen the dancing if stately Graces in the Primavera by Sandro Botticelli (1444/5–1510), since that picture was in a villa outside Florence (Related works, no. 7a).716 Tintoretto’s composition of the Graces with Mercury in the Doge’s Palace in Venice would probably have been more accessible to him (Related works, no. 7b.I);717 here they seem to have been sitting and just beginning to stand up.During his long career Rubens made many variations on the theme of three nude women where the inspiration of predecessors shines through to a greater or lesser extent – chiefly the Three Graces, but also Venus, Minerva and Juno in the Judgement of Paris. What Rubens is doing in DPG264 is attempting to depict essentially the same woman from three angles simultaneously. In that he was competing directly with Titian’s mythological poesie painted for Philip II a century earlier, that he had seen during his visits to the Spanish court.718 Rubens’s groups are either just standing or carrying an object, with the central one seen either from the front or from the back. There are also groups with nude women in different contexts (mythological or biblical) dancing or reaching out.Closest to the Antique groups are the standing Three Graces, with the central one seen from the back. Rubens made some compositions of this type rather late in his career: the drawing in Warsaw is dated c. 1635 (Related works, no. 8a) and the Prado picture c. 1636–8 (Related works, nos 8b.I–II) [8].Earlier, in the 1620s, Rubens composed scenes with the Three Graces carrying something above their heads, changing them almost into caryatids (though the things are held up in their hands, not supported on their heads). In a drawing in the Courtauld Institute of Art Gallery the figures are similarly posed, with the central one seen from behind (Related works, no. 9a), but sometimes the central one is seen from the front. Rubens owned a cameo with the Three Graces where the central one is seen frontally, as is the left one, and the right one is seen from behind (Related works, no. 3d) [7]. Rubens compositions with the central Grace seen from the front influenced the work of Georg Petel, a German sculptor who worked in Rubens’s studio in the 1620s.719 A bronze relief by him with the Three Graces has largely survived and is in Boston (Related works, no. 9b). Rubens made designs for the Petel group, where the Graces are carrying a basket of flowers. According to Scholten, pictures in Vienna and Stockholm (Related works, nos 9c [9]; and 9d.I) are inspired by Petel’s relief.720 In a drawing related to the late Feast of Venus in Vienna (Related works, nos 9e and 18) the group carry a fountain above their heads.Even earlier is the Judgment of Paris in the National Gallery, London, which according to David Jaffé was painted when Rubens was still in Antwerp, before he went to Italy (Related works, no. 10). Some twenty years later Rubens resumed his variations on the theme of three nude women in one of the pictures in the Medici cycle for the Palais du Luxembourg in Paris: in The Education of Maria de’ Medici he depicts the Three Graces, with the central one seen from the front and the right-hand one seen from the back, slightly from the side (Related works, nos 11a–b). According to Bodart in 1990, that group is related to the bozzetto of the Three Graces in the Palazzo Pitti (Related works, no. 14a.I), the one that was later used by Gerard van Opstal for one of his ivory objects (Related works, no. 22a; see above). The Pitti bozzetto includes putti, which do not feature in the Medici picture.The Three Graces appear with putti in a sketch in the Rubens Cantoor by Willem Panneels, probably after a composition by Rubens. The putti are walking on the ground, flying in the air and putting a crown on the head of the Grace in the middle (Related works, no. 13) [10]. The drawing by Rubens in London was probably an earlier version of this (Related works, no. 12). The same putti appear, with the three women completely dressed, in a now lost picture by Rubens (Related works, no. 15a.Ic) that we only know from the modello in Milan and the prints by Remoldus Eynhoudt or Cornelis Schut I and Maria Cosway (1760–1838) (Related works, nos 15a.Ib and 15a.II–III) [11]. In 1890 Rooses related this lost picture to DPG264. It is questionable whether he was right. In Warsaw there is a (preparatory?) drawing for this vanished picture with three richly dressed young women (Related works, no. 15a.Ia) on one side and on the other side a group which is clearly the Three Graces (Related works, no. 8a). At one point for Rubens the subjects were related, at least physically, on the verso and recto. In these works with putti crowning the Graces the central figure is seen frontally; the Grace or woman on the right is now seen from behind (or from the side; Related works, nos 12–15). This position of the Graces is similar to that in Rubens’s Antique cameo, though in the cameo there are no putti with crowns (Related works, no. 3d) [7].We find similar groups of figures reaching out and/or dancing in depictions of the Blessed, as in the picture in Munich of the Assumption of the Righteous (Related works, nos 16a–b). We see a comparable group in the Birth of Venus in the modello for a silver basin in the National Gallery, c. 1630–31 (Related works, no. 2a) [3] and the later version in Brussels for the Torre de la Parada (1638), after which Cornelis de Vos (c. 1584–1651) made a painting, now in the Prado (Related works, nos 17a–b). Behind Petel’s ivory group of Venus and the Nereids now in Stockholm (c. 1627–8; Related works, no. 2d.III) [5] are at least one drawing by Rubens, in the British Museum, and the modello in the Fitzwilliam Museum (Related works, no...

Peter Paul Rubens DPG125

... after Rubens (Private collection).262Previous recorded treatment: 1911, lining suggested by Fisseld but no action was taken; 1936, panel lightly paraffined to treat for woodworm; 1950s(?), conserved, Dr Hell; 1967(?), new frame after burglary; 2003, conserved, S. Plender.RELATED WORKS1a) (bozzetto; grisaille) Peter Paul Rubens, St Barbara fleeing from her Father, panel, 15.5 x 20.9 cm. Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, WA1855.178 [1].2631b) Prime version: Peter Paul Rubens, Anthony van Dyck and other assistants, St Barbara fleeing from her Father, canvas, c. 300 x 420 cm, ceiling painting in the south aisle of the Jesuit Church in Antwerp, destroyed in 1718.2642) Copy: Christian-Benjamin Müller after Peter Paul Rubens (1b), St Barbara, inscriptions, red chalk and grey wash, 188 x 295 mm (oval). Museum Plantin-Moretus, Antwerp, PK.OT.00438 | A.20.6 [2].2653a.I) Copy: Jacob de Wit after Peter Paul Rubens (1b), St Barbara (from a group of 36 drawings after Rubens’s ceiling decorations in the Jesuit Church, Antwerp, for engraving and publication by Jan Punt); red chalk, 290 x 393 mm (oval). BM, London, 1921,0411.62 [3].2663a.II) Copy: Jacob de Wit after Peter Paul Rubens (1b), St Barbara, watercolour, 180 x 225 mm (oval). Courtauld Institute of Art Gallery, London, Princes Gate Bequest, D.1978.PG.428.25 [4].2673a.III) Copy: Jacob de Wit after Peter Paul Rubens (1b), St Barbara fleeing from her Father, watercolour, 126 x 168 mm (oval). Museum Plantin-Moretus, Antwerp, PK.OT.00471 | D.7.5.2683b) Print after 3a.I (in the same direction): Jan Punt after Jacob de Wit (3c; in reverse) after Peter Paul Rubens (1b), The Flight of St Barbara, 1751, etching and engraving, 304 (trimmed) x 393 mm (oval; pl. 36 of the book with the ceiling paintings). BM, London, 1875,0710.3015.2693c) Copy (partial, in reverse, reworked counterproof?): Jacob de Wit after Peter Paul Rubens, St Barbara, black and red chalk, grey and brown wash, (octagonal) 190 x 254 mm. RPK, RM, Amsterdam, RP-T-1951-306.2704a) Copy (detail): Postage stamp of Antigua and Barbuda, Christmas 1978 (25 cents).4b) Copy (detail): Postage stamp of Sierra Leone, Easter 1991 (10 Le).271Another composition by Rubens5) Peter Paul Rubens, The Martyrdom of St Ursula, panel, 49 x 39 cm. KMSKB, Brussels, 1198.272Depictions of the interior of the Jesuit Church before the fire of 17186a) Pieter Neeffs I and Sebastian Vrancx (figs), Interior of the Jesuit Church, Antwerp, c. 1630, signed S. Vrancx, panel, 52 x 70.7 cm. Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, GG_1051.2736b) Wilhelm Schubert van Ehrenberg and Hieronymus Janssens (figs), Interior of the Church of the Jesuits, Antwerp, signed and dated W.S. von / Ehrenberg fec / 1667, canvas, 118.5 x 145 cm. KMSKB, Brussels, 3603.2746c) Antoon Gheringh, Interior of the Church of the Jesuits, Antwerp, canvas, 107 x 142 cm. Martin-von-Wagner-Museum der Universität Würzburg, Würzburg, 349.2756d) Wilhelm Schubert van Ehrenberg, Interior of the Antwerp Jesuit Church, canvas, 115 x 127 cm. Rubenshuis, Antwerp, RH.S.175 [5].276Other di sotto in su compositions7a) Paolo Veronese, Esther crowned by Ahasverus, 1556, canvas, 450 x 370 cm. San Sebastiano, Venice.2777b) Paolo Veronese, Justice and Peace before Venice enthroned on the Globe, 1575–8, canvas, 250 x 180 cm. Sala del Collegio, Palazzo Ducale, Venice.2787c) Modello for 7d: Peter Paul Rubens, Esther before Ahasverus, 1620, panel, 50.1 x 47.2 cm. Courtauld Institute of Art Gallery, London, Princes Gate Bequest, P.1978.PG.367.2797d) Prime version: Peter Paul Rubens, Anthony van Dyck and other assistants, Esther before Ahasverus, canvas, c. 300 x 420 cm (octagonal), ceiling painting in the Jesuit Church, destroyed in 1718.2808) Titian, David and Goliath, 1542–4, canvas, 292 x 282 cm. Santa Maria della Salute, Venice (originally in...

... li to the patron; if he kept them, he had to paint an additional altarpiece.290 Rubens chose the latter option.In 1718 large parts of the Jesuit Church were destroyed by fire, and the ceiling paintings were lost. What the church looked like before the fire is recorded in some images made in the 17th and early 18th century by Antwerp painters including Pieter Neefs I (c. 1578/90– 1656/61), Wilhelm Schubert van Ehrenberg (1630–in or after 1687) and Antoon Gheringh (1630/37–68) (Related works, nos 6a–d).291 Paintings of church interiors were a distinctive genre in Antwerp, mainly intended to give a good view of a church, often with decorative figures in contemporary dress. The view is taken in the middle of the nave, with the aisles on left and right (see for instance DPG141, Pieter Neefs I). Only rarely do they show the ceilings of the aisles and the galleries. In a picture by Schubert van Ehrenberg dated 1668 we see a little bit more (Related works, no. 6d) [5], but not the part where the picture with St Barbara was located. Several modelli and bozzetti by Rubens have survived, for instance in Vienna (six) and in the Courtauld Institute (five and a fragment).292 In addition, the 18th-century Amsterdam painter Jacob de Wit, a great admirer of Rubens, made drawings of 36 of 39 scenes when he was in Antwerp in 1711–12, aged on...

Cornelis de VOS

... 1635.20 De Vos often used the same setting for his portraits (chair, curtain with tassel, and columns): a similar background, with columns on the left and a red curtain with tassel, appears in a portrait of a lady by De Vos in San Francisco (Related works, no. 3) [4].This full-length life-size portrait of an elderly woman seated in an armchair is rather unusual. Such portraits were first made for Spanish and Austrian royalty, following models by Raphael (1483–1520) and Titian (c. 1488/90–1576). Members of the nobility came to be depicted in this way in regions including Mantua, Genoa and Great Britain, for instance Alathea Talbot, Countess of Arundel (1582–1654), c. 1618 (Related works, no. 5).21 However, between c. 1618 and c. 1640 burghers in Antwerp and Amsterdam, striving to enhance their status, commissioned similar portraits.22 Anthony van Dyck painted a seated Antwerp lady, probably of the Vinck/Vincque family of merchants, around 1619 (Related works, no. 6).The lady in DPG290 is dressed in an old-fashioned way. She wears an elaborate ruff, a black widow's cap, and an embroidered black dress with a furred vlieger (a 16th-century pinafore dress) costume, which is very like the attire of Magdalena de Cuyper, also from Antwerp, in a portrait by Jordaens, c. 1635–6 (Related works, no. 4) [5]. In her left hand she holds a lace handkerchief and in her right a book, probably religious, her place marked by her index finger, no doubt referring to a pious life. The handkerchief, however, was a sign of wealth, in the Southern and Northern Netherlands23 and in England, as in the portrait of the Countess of Arundel (Related works, no. 5).The best clue to the sitter’s identity is the arms behind her with a well and stripes. Bert Watteeuw of the Rubenianum drew attention to a monument in St George’s Church in Antwerp, dated 1559, with a coat of arms incorporating the same well and stripes (Related works, no. 1) [2]. The monument is dedicated by ‘Henricus’ and Alexander van der Goes to their parents, ‘Petrus’ van der Goes (1520–86) and his wife, Alexandrina Balbani (?–1605?).24 The quartered coat of arms in the background of DPG290 shows the same united arms of the Van der Goes families (golden well on saber) and Balbani (golden eagles on stripes of azure on silver). Later Watteeuw identified the sitter as Maria van der Goes (1555–1642), daughter of Peter van der Goes and Alexandrina Balbani. She married Jan della Faille the Younger (1542–1618). She became a widow in 1618, which explains her dress in the picture. It seems that her son Alexander I della Faille (1587–1653) owned this portrait at the time of his death.25The Balbani were a family of merchants from Lucca who settled first in Bruges, then later in the 16th century in Antwerp. The Van der Goes family also had mercantile roots. They were not aristocratic families pur sang, but they were among the most successful and certainly the richest Antwerp merchant families, and were thus at the top of the patriarchiate, with aspirations to nobility that were fulfilled through marriages later in the 17th century.26Sir George Scharf (1820–95), who in 1857 became Secretary of the National Portrait Gallery, and later its Director, on one of his many tours around the British Isles sketched some of the portraits in the Dulwich Gallery. In 1859 he drew two paintings that were thought to be by Rubens, DPG285 and DPG290 (Related works, no. 7) [6]. As was common opinion at the time, he thought that DPG290 was a picture Rubens painted before he went to Italy. Clearly Scharf did not like it very much, since he noted: ‘very poorly painted; rather weak; bright & crude’; it is not clear who the Mr. Brodering is (a collector?) with whose paintings he compares DPG290....

Rembrandt DPG163

... regular diamond pattern with neat vertical brushstrokes below. This might be a hanging textile with a fringed lower edge. Paint sample analysis identified large particles of azurite and some red lake, mixed with bright red earth and black. This suggests that this enigmatic area was once a deep purple.Previous recorded treatment: 1866, ‘revived’, varnished and relined onto a new stretcher by Holder; 1938, cleaned, Dr Hell; 1947, cleaned/restored (green curtain removed by Dr Hell); 1950s, reframed; 1980, examined, National Maritime Museum; 1992, technical analysis, Courtauld Institute of Art, Dr A. Burnstock; 2000, frame treated for insect infestation; 2005, consolidated, cleaned and restored, revarnished, S. Plender.RELATED WORKS1a) (paired with DPG163 between 1732 and 1776) Govert Flinck, A Young Woman as a Shepherdess (Saskia as Flora), falsely signed and dated Rembrandt f. 1633, canvas, 66.7 x 50.5 cm (oval). MMA, New York, Bequest of Lilian S. Timken, 1959, 60.71.15 [2].851b) Preparatory drawing: Rembrandt, Study for the painting ‘A Girl at a Window’ of 1645, black chalk touched with white, 83 x 65 mm. Courtauld Gallery, Princes Gate Bequest, London, D.1978.PG192 [3].861c.I) Pieter Lastman, The Wedding Night of Tobias and Sarah (Tobias 8:23), signed and dated P. Lastman fecit 1611, panel, 41.2 x 57.8 cm. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 62.985.871c.II) Rembrandt, A Woman in Bed / Sarah waiting for Tobias, c. 1647, signed and dated Rembra[…] f. 164[7], canvas, 81.1. x 67.8 cm (arched top). National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh, NG 827 [4] .881d) Rembrandt, The Militia Company of Captain Frans Banning Cocq and Lieutenant Willem van Ruytenburch (The Nightwatch), signed and dated Rembrandt f. 1642, canvas, 379.5 × 453.5 cm. RM, Amsterdam (on loan from the City of Amsterdam), SK–C–5.89Pictures of similar girls by Rembrandt and his school2a) Jan Victors, Young Girl at a Window, signed and dated JAN FICTOOR.FE 1640, canvas, 93 x 78 cm. Louvre, Paris, 1286 [5].902b.I) (pair with 2b.II?) Rembrandt, Girl in a Picture Frame, signed and dated Rembrandt f. 1641, panel, 105.5 x 76.3 cm. Royal Castle, Warsaw, ZKW/3906.912b.II) (pair with 2b.I?) Rembrandt, Scholar at his Writing Table, signed and dated Rembrandt f. 1641, panel 105.7 x 76.4 cm. Royal Castle, Warsaw, ZKW/3905.922c) Rembrandt, A Girl at a Window (The Kitchen Maid), signed and dated Rembrandt f. 1651, canvas, 78 x 63 cm. Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, NM 584 [6].932d) Studio of Rembrandt, Girl with a Broom, c. 1646–7, falsely signed and dated Rembrandt f. 1651, canvas, 107.3 x 91.4 cm. NGA, Washington, 1937.1.74.942e) Attributed to Samuel van Hoogstraten, Girl in a Half-Door, canvas, 75 x 60 cm (arched top). Marquess of Tavistock and the Trustees of the Woburn Estates, Woburn Abbey, 1405.952f) Attributed to Samuel van Hoogstraten, Girl at an Open Half-Door, c. 1645, falsely signed and dated Rembrandt f. 1645, canvas, 102.5 x 85.1 cm. Art Institute of Chicago, Mr & Mrs Martin A. Ryerson Collection, 1894.1022.96Headdress3a) Rembrandt, The Death of the Virgin, signed and dated Rembrandt f. 1639, etching and drypoint, 410 x 315 mm. BM, London, F,5.26.973b) Rembrandt, Three Studies of a Child, One Study of a Woman, c. 1640–45, brown ink, brown wash, and white opaque watercolour on white antique laid paper, 215 x 161 mm. Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University Art Museums, Cambridge, Gift of Meta and Paul J. Sachs, 1949.4 [7].983c) Stefano della Bella, Two studies of a woman with a North Holland headdress, c. 1647, pen in brown ink over black chalk, 95 x 110 mm. Private collection.99Some later copies and variationsFrance4a.I) Copy (with a basket of onions): Jean-Baptiste Santerre, La Jardinière, c. 1708–9, canvas, 81 x 65 cm. Musée des Beaux-Arts, Orléans, 14 [8].1004a.II) Studio of Jean-Baptiste Santerre, L’Attention, canvas, 72 x 52 cm. Musée national du château de Fontainebleau, 8698 4.1014b) Print after no. 4a.I (in reverse): Pierre Louis (de) Surugue after Jean-Baptiste Santerre, Sylvie at a Window, c. 1719, inscriptions, etching and engraving, 258 x 189 mm. BM, London, 1874,0808.1825.1024c) Pastiche: Jean Raoux, A Girl at a Window, drawing, 210 x 165 mm. Musée des Beaux-Arts et d’Archéologie, Besançon, D.1583.1034d) Copy (flowers added): French, first half of the 19th century (formerly attributed to Jean Raoux), 86.5 x 90.7 cm. Museé des Beaux-Arts, Libourne, D.2004.1.69.104Germany5a) Free copy: Antoine Pesne (1683–1757), Girl at a Window. Staatliche Schlösser und Gärten, Potsdam-Sanssouci.1055b) Print (same direction): Carl Gottlieb Rasp, engraving, signed and dated Rinbrant inv. C.GF. rasp sc. 1770/6 (?).Great Britain6a) Copy: A. Grenville-Scott, Girl at a Window, 1774 or 1779, pastel, 654 x 546 mm. Lord Polworth collection.1066b) Copy: formerly attrib. to Sir Joshua Reynolds, Girl at a Window, canvas, 62.9 x 53 cm. Hermitage, St Petersburg.1076c) (inspiration) Sir Joshua Reynolds, The Laughing Girl, canvas, 91.5 x 71.2 cm. The Iveagh Bequest, Kenwood (English Heritage).1086d) (inspiration) John Opie, Mrs Opie, c. 1806, canvas, 89.3 x 63.7 cm. Private collection, UK.1096e) Print (same direction): William Say, Rembrandt’s Peasant Girl, c. 1814, mezzotint, hand-coloured, 505 x 349 mm. BM, London, 1861,1109.286 [9].1106f) (inspiration) J. M. W. Turner, Jessica, exh. 1830, canvas, 122 x 91.5 cm. Tate Britain (at Petworth House), T03887.1116g) Print (same direction): John Rogers, inscriptions, 1830s, mezzotint, 168 (trimmed?) x 128 (trimmed?) mm. BM, London, 2010,7081.6963.1126h) Miniature copy: Isabella Fawcett, c. 1840, watercolour, 138 x 113 mm. Private collection, UK.1136i) Copy: Unknown artist, c. 1870s, canvas, 63.5 x 50.8 cm (oval). Private collection, UK.1146j) Frances L. Grace, The Dulwich Rembrandt, c. 1878–9, canvas, 26.3 x 28.8 cm. Present whereabouts unknown (Morgan Grenfell & Co. Ltd, 1993) [10].1156k) Copy: Tom Keating, c. 1950s, watercolour and pencil underdrawing, 360 x 290 mm. Private collection, UK.1166l) Free copy: Simon Edmondson, inscribed and dated Study at Dulwich 17.9.90, canvas, 22.5 x 33 cm. Grob Gallery, London.1176m) Copy: Unknown artist, Paraja, the Mulatta Slave of Valasquez, lithograph, photo Warburg Institute.118United States7a) Copy after DPG163 and no. 6e: Thomas Sully, Rembrandt’s Peasant Girl, copper, 15.8 x 21.6 cm. Private collection, San Francisco, 1851.1197b) Free copy: Rembrandt Peale, Portrait of Rosalba Peale, 1846. El Paso Museum of Art, Fort Worth, Texas.120Comparable trompe l’œil8a) Flemish School, Boy at a Window, c. 1550–60, panel, 73.8 x 61.6 cm. Royal Collection Trust, RCIN 404972.121Gold chain9) Rembrandt, Self-Portrait in a Flat Cap, 1642, panel, 70.4 x 58.8 cm. Royal Collection Trust, RCIN, 404120.122Lent to the RA to be copied in 1816, 1839, 1855, 1861, 1867, 1878, 1879, 1880, 1890, and 1899(?)....

... 18th-century Swedish inventory the Kitchen Maid was recorded as a ‘young boy’.135 The setting, with the stone ledge and the dark background, is indistinct. Rembrandt seems to have offered a visual mystery to arouse curiosity: the picture seems very realistic, but what do we really see? The only surviving related study (Related works, 1b) [3] is no help: the girl rests her arms straightforwardly on a table, and there is something negroid about her eyes and nose.136Several attempts have been made to interpret the subject.137 Koslow in 1975 argued that it illustrates idleness: the girl hides her right hand ‘in her bosom’ (in fact in her sleeve), so she is an example of the idle servant, an iconographic theme that goes back to the 15th century.138 Wheelock in 1993 rejected that interpretation; and indeed, albeit in France a century later, a copy of the picture was given the title L’Attention, the opposite of idleness (Related works, no. 4a.II).Another suggestion was that, because of what was read as a gold chain around her neck, she was a courtesan. But her arms that are half sunburnt, and even seem to have some insect bites, indicate that she is a girl who lives and works in the open air. William Say called his mezzotint of 1814 Rembrandt’s Peasant Girl (Related works, no. 6e) [9]. The gold chain is a problem for the interpretation of the girl as a simple servant, as she had been called since Roger de Piles in 1708. A solution was offered by inventories of such girls, where the only valuable possession was often a gold chain; and Rembrandt could have lent her one as a prop. However, very careful examination shows that what is around her neck is not two rows of the same gold chain but two ties of her loose gown, with the same decoration as on the cuffs and on the seam between the bodice and the sleeves. Our recent observation was already noticed and published by Ann Sumner in 1994, but her entry was clearly not noticed by later writers.139 At the 2019–20 exhibition at Dulwich, where DPG163 hung near Rembrandt’s Self-Portrait from the Royal Collection (Related works, no. 9), painted three years earlier, it became very clear how Rembrandt painted a real gold chain.The possibility that the girl might be the protagonist of an Old Testament story was investigated and dismissed.140 However the Woman in Bed in Edinburgh, as she is called by the gallery there (Related works, no. 1c.II) [4],141 was rather convincingly interpreted as Sarah waiting for Tobias on their wedding night by Van de Wetering in 2015 (following Tümpel), from the example of that scene by Pieter Lastman dated 1611 (Related works, no. 1c.I). Her (Jewish?) metal headdress seems to be Rembrandt’s invention,142 as does the cap with a red tassel in DPG163.143 A little girl in a drawing apparently from life (Related works, no. 3b) [7] appears to wear a ribbon intricately encircling her head, with hanging ends, somewhat similar to that in DPG163. Headdresses were a feature of costume in North Holland: a print of the Death of the Virgin, c. 1639, shows one on a young woman at the far right (Related works, no. 3a), and the Italian draughtsman Stefano della Bella recorded one during his travels in the Netherlands (Related works, no. 3c); but in neither case are there ribbons or tassels as in DPG163. Marieke de Winkel thinks it highly unlikely that a servant girl would have been dressed in a shirt only, and considers that the shirt and the cap are a kind of fantasy clothing, which gives her, and other girls and women similarly depicted by Rembrandt, a strong romantic and timeless note.144Thus what Rembrandt painted here, as part of the exercises in trompe-l’œil effects that interested him at the time, is a very realistic, illusionistic, and attractive picture of a girl, which has so far defied interpretation. That is probably exactly what he wanted: a picture that still after nearly four hundred years invites the viewer to look very carefully, and to engage in finding new meanings.The picture led to many copies and variations in France, Germany, Great Britain and the United States, of which the list of Related works gives only a selection (nos 4a–4d, 5a–5b, 6a–6m [8-10], 7a–7b). The pupils of the Royal Academy had to copy it nine or ten times in the 19th century. In 1949 it was at £33,000 the most expensive of the sixteen Dulwich paintings which were then valued by Thomas Agnew and Sons (the cheapest, at £100, was Adriaen van de Velde’s DPG51 Cows and Sheep in a Wood). DPG163 is still considered to be one of the highlights of the Dulwich Picture Gallery collection, if not the image of the collection....