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paightwood Galleries, Inc.
120 Main Street, Upton MA 01568-6193; 800-809-3343; email sptwd@verizon.net
“Old Master Drawings from the late 15th-century to the late 18th”
"Claude Garache (French, b. 1929): A Selection of Paintings, Aquatints, and a Drawing"
Gallery Tour II: 15th-18th Century Dutch, Flemish, German, and French Drawings + Garache
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Several years ago we acquired, with the assistance of a rare book dealer in Brussels, a portfolio of drawings on laid paper, many of which are clearly from the same hand and some of which are signed I:D:N (one is signed I:N:D, some are not signed at all, and one is signed "de Neufforge" with a flourish.) According to both Benezit and Thieme-Becker's biographical encyclopedias of artists, Jean-François de Neufforge was born in Comblain-au-Point, Belgium in 1714 and died in Paris on 19 December 1791. According to an article by Claire Baines in the Grove Dictionary of Art (2000), 22: 925, Neufforge, an architect and sculptor, arrived in Paris around 1738 and studied engraving with Pierre Edmé Babel and architecture with Jacques-François Blondel. Although he worked primarily in the Rococo style, he was also interested in classical sculpture and was aware of his contemporaries, particularly François Boucher (1703-1770). Neufforge's great work was the Recueil élémentaire d'architecture containing roughly 900 architectural engravings, nearly all of which he both designed and engraved (published in several parts in 1757-68 and 1772-1780). .
Our drawings are on thick laid paper with several different watermarks (though some have no watermark at all). Some treat the same subject (often with one signed and one or two others unsigned); some are surrounded by framing lines as if they were presentation drawings or intended for an album, some are not; some seem to be designed as engravings and have a space reserved for a descriptive printed text, some do not. Some are clearly drawn from life; others seem as though they might have been taken from classical or Renaissance sculptures. Some of the drawings have a marvelous liveliness about them, some are more weighty; all are very well done and in very good condition with the exception of the occasional handling crease or stain, mostly invisible when matted. None show signs of having been matted in the past: they seem to have been kept in a leather case and show no signs of either light or mat stain.
The drawings represent another kind of activity. Stylistically, many of the drawings—particularly those of women—show the influence of Boucher and the color crayon noir manner engraving style used to reproduce his works. These engravings, very similar to Woman with turban or Woman with pearl necklace looking down (both on I:D:N: Women) or Seated male nude below are currently selling for prices up to $10,000 at auction. It is quite possible that some of our drawings were executed as models for such prints.
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For more specific information about the works in the show, we refer you to the relevent pages on our website, I.D.N. Drawings: Religious, I.D.N. Drawings: Men, and I.D.N. Drawings: Women. Above left: Man Debating; beneath: Man Debating II. These works show a man in the act of speaking and, given the contemporary dress, they have the look of portraits. I must confess, however, that we have not yet attempted to discover if they would have been recognisable to a contemporary audience.
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When the drawings arrived, two stood out as looking to have been done in the ambience of Rubens and one looked decidedly later than the others. The remainder all looked all shared a common feel and, on occasion, one of a pair would be unsigned and the other would be signed I:D:N. Looking through several biographical dictionaries of artists with a focus on the 18th century, one name stood out: Jean-Francois de Neufforge. Imagine my delight when our younger son pointed out to me that one of them was signed in black chalk "de Neufforge" with a flourish at the end of the name!
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Top row: Claude Garache, Agripaume (aquatint, 1972), Yvie (aquatint, 1979), Bleue II (aquatint, 1983)—the links will take you to the page of our website on which the work in question will be found.
Middle row: the first two drawings on the left are from a late 15th-century Netherlandish hand-written and illustrated book of Saints' Lives (probably the Legenda Aurea or Golden Legend, the most popular collection of the lives and legends of the saints, compiled by Jacobus de Voragine, of which over 1000 manuscript copies survived the invention of movable type. Our two drawings (both done in pen and brown ink and wash) are Mary Magdalen raised to heaven by angels to feed upon spiritual food and St. Peter freed from chains by an angel, appear to date from the late 15th century and to have been commissioned by someone who must have believed that books were a passing fad; Maarten de Vos (Antwerp, 1532-1603), Allegory of Abundance and Prosperity. Pen and brown ink and wash on cream laid paper; Bernaert van Orley (Netherlandish, 1492-1542), Susannah and the elders. Pen and sepia ink drawing on laid paper without a watermark, c. 1530. Image size: 115x82mm; the final drawing in the middle row is a late 16th-century Dutch Bearded man with fantastic helmet. Pen and brown ink. This drawing features a wonderful Mannerist helmet adorned with two captives holding up the feathers on the crest of the helmet and calls to mind Prince Arthur's helmet, which features a crouching dragon underneath of a crest of "discolored hairs dancing diversely" in Book I of Edmund Spenser's Faerie Queene (1590). Like a series of later etchings by Wenzel Hollar after Parmigianino (see Jacquekine Burgers, Wenceslaus Hollar: Seventeenth-Century Prints from the Museum Boymans-van Beuningen Museum, Rotterdam [Alexandria VA: Art Services International, 1994], plates 97 a-97c), this drawing may have been inspired by an Italian model inspired by descriptions like those in Ariosto's Orlando Furioso; since the Ariosto text itself spawned many literary descendants, it is also popssible that the only model may have been the imagination of the anonymous artist. Laid down on a sheet of tinted laid paper with a high crown watermark and an annotation on the verso: "Coll: Piekostellit Braundegee." Image size: 127x95mm.
Bottom row: Follower of Hendrik Goltzius (Dutch, 1558-1617), Sarah overhearing the angels announce to Abraham that she is going to give birth. Red chalk on thin laid paper. This splendid example of late 16th-century Dutch Mannerist style is a drawing based upon Jacob Matham's engraving after his step-father Hendrik Goltzius' drawing for the series, Wives of the Patriarchs (c. 1590). The drawing is a very close copy of Matham's engraving (B. 248) and was probably made by an artist wanting to preserve the composition for later use. The drawing has been mounted on a leaf for an old collector's album and has ruled decorative borders surrounding the drawing. Image size: 240x165mm. The next four works are related to compositions by Abraham Bloemaert (Dutch, 1566-1651), the founder of a dynasty of artists who dominated the art scene in Utrecht for almost 80 years. Bloemaert was a prolific draftsman who executed over 1500 drawings, many of which served as models for prints. A recent 2-volume study of Bloemaert by Marcel Georges Roethlisberger, Abraham Bloemaert and His Sons (Doornspiijk: Davaco Publisher, 1993), argues that we should try to see him as his contemporaries saw him: as the foremost master of Utrecht, his stature comparable to that of his contemporaries Hendrick Goltzius and Cornelis van Haarlem. Bloemaert painted at least 200 paintings and designed over 625 prints that were engraved by such masters as Jacob Matham, Jan Saenredam, Jan Muller, Schelte à Bolswert, and his sons Cornelis and Frederick Bloemaert. During his career of over 60 years, he moved from mannerist works in the style of Spranger and the school of Haarlem to a realist approach, a Caravaggesque interlude, a stint at court art, and a final classicizing style. He treated a multitude of themes from the Old and New Testament, altarpieces, mythological works, landscapes, and genre pieces, with important contributions in each field. A fervent Catholic with Jesuit ties, he is the chief representative of Dutch Catholic art. The first of Bloemaert's compositions is The Penitent Magdalene. Pen and brown ink heightened with white on laid paper mounted on gray paper, early 17th c. Image size: 130x90mm. Next to it is the largest of his drawings in our show, Phoebus Apollo and Clymene. Brush and black and gray ink and wash with white ink heightening on cream laid paper, early 17th c. The most available version of the story for Renaissance painters and their public would have been Ovid, where the center of the story is not Helios (or Apollo) and Clymene, but their son Phaeton (Metamorphoses I:1038-II: 495). Although most of the story centers around the vain and unwise effort of Phaeton to be publicly acclaimed as his father's son, a task he thinks to accomplish by driving his father's chariot across the heavens for one day, the love of his parents for him and each other is what enables the tragedy of his fall to occur. Ex-collection Walter Beck (Lugt supplement 2603, verso) and R. von Kühlmann, according to an old inscription on the old mat. Continuing to the right, a very beautiful drawing of St. Jerome Praying after an engraving by Schelte Adam Bolswaert after a drawing by Blowmaert followed by the engraving itself.
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At top: Jan Sadeler (Antwerp 1550-1600), Methuselah and his children (Jan Sadeler, TIB 7001.34, Holl. 1980 34) Engraving after Maarten de Vos, c. 1586. One of the many collaborations between Maarten de Vos and Jan Sadeler, here as part of a series on The Story of the Family of Seth (1586). Inscribed at top: "VI"; "Sadel: auct: scalpsit / Vos figur" lower right. The story of the Creation, Fall, and its Consequences may have seemed to offer a way of understanding the religious wars during the period, especially in the Netherlands, where Spanish armies were frequently unleashed upon towns and cities where Protestants could be found and slaughtered. Image size: 208x274mm. Included with the painting below.
Willem Buytewech (Rotterdam, 1591-1624), Methuselah and his children. Grisaille on wood after an engraving by Jan Sadeler based on a drawing by Maarten de Vos, c. 1612-15; signed lower left Although our piece is not done in one of Buytewech's later styles, Haverkamp Begemann (1974) includes a 1615 drawing very reminiscent of Goltzius or Matham (Willem Buytewech 1591-1624, item 24, plate 46) and the commentary notes that familiarity with the works of 16th-century Northern European artists could have been expected at that time (e.g., Rudolph II’s fixation on Durer, the Lucas van Leyden revival in Goltzius’ circle). Given that the Wierix brothers made engravings after Durer's prints for their Master’s pieces, it seems possible that Buytewech made this for a similar purpose (which would suggest a date of c. 1612). Another possibility is that given the sheer number of drawings by Maarten de Vos (1531-1603) made for engravers and print publishers (c. 1600 engravings were made based upon his drawings), Buytewech could have been familiar with them in general and this one in particular and may have chosen it to advertise his familiarity with the traditions of late 16th-century Netherlandish art and his skill at working in different media; it could also have been a commission for a young artist just beginning a career that might have been useful from a financial point of view as well as showing his ability to meet a patron’s needs. If Buytewech was born in 1591, he was about 24-25 years old when he did the Goltzius-style Homme en costume de fantasie; when he was admitted master in 1612 (in Haarlem, where he had been living since 1611), he was then 21-22 and perhaps feeling a need to show his mastery of all of the recent Netherlandish styles. Buytewech's drawings were interesting enough that some of them were engraved by others (including C. van Kittensteyn, G. van Schneydel, and Jan II van de Velde) and collected by others including Rembrandt. Interestingly, his drawings make much higher prices at auction than his paintings (Christie's NY and London records 4 sales between 2002 and 2006 ranging from $94,973 (a small study of a man in the manner of Goltzius or Matham [Haverkamp Begemann plate 46]) to $420,000 (the two in the middle sold for $380,000 and $400,000), all of which were in one of his later styles and all of which were much smaller than ours. Condition: very good save for a small chip lower edge center; the wood has warped and it has been mounted on a wood cradle to prevent further warping and to stabilize it. Image size: 398x613mm (15-3/4x24-3/16 inches). Price: $150,000.
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Top row: Claude Garache, Dode Rouge (aquatint, 1978), Dode II (aquatint, 1979), Auche II (aquatint, 1982)—the links will take you to the page of our website on which the work in question will be found.
Middle row: Flemish School, 17th Century, A Saint interceding with the Virgin and the Trinity. Pen and ink and wash on laid paper with the fleur-de-lys watermark, early 17th century. Formerly in the collection of Dr. Hans Tauber with his stamp on the verso. Clearly a model for an altarpiece, a monk gestures towards three figures in need of aid. The Christ child reasches out to him as winged angels assist those below. Image size: 270x164mm. The next three pieces are all attributed to Peter Pauil Rubens (1577-1640): Untitled (St. Peter showing Sapphira the body of her dead husband. Pen and brown ink and charcoal on laid paper. Acts 5: 1-10 tells the story of Ananias and his wife Sapphira who "lied . . . unto God" by conspiring to withhold a promised gift. According to Rubens at Oxford (1988, p. 42), this preliniary drawing (which we have attributed to Rubens) would have been described in a 17th-century inventory as a "crabbelinge" or scribble and shows Rubens in the act of creating. There is another drawing on the reverse (click here). For similar drawings in this style and format, see also Held, Rubens: Selected Drawings (1986), 186-190, 205-209. Image size: 113x93mm. In the middest of the wall, we have St. Francis receiving the stigmata, a charcoal sketch in which the artist began strengthening the lines with pen and brown ink. The drawing is done on the reverse of a cancelled draft of a letter done at the request of His Majesty, to the "intendente generale" (or steward) of the King's household, concerning four large paintings, three for her majesty the Queen and one for her majesty the Princess. The letter is in Rubens' handwriting and the only king who would fit the profile would be Louis XIII, son of the martyred Henri IV and his widowed wife, Marie de Medici, who commissioned a large series (presently in the Louvre) depicting her life in quasi-mythological visions; Marie had three daughters, one of whom married the king of Spain, one the King of Engliand, and the last the Duke of Savoy, whom I take to be the recipient of the fourth painting. St. Francis is here in the act of receiving the Stigmata from an infant Christ while his companion, Friar Leo, sleeps. Several other angels and saints watch from the clouds. Image size: 168x112mm. Next to it, we have Abraham and Isaac turning away from a weeping Sarah: Abraham and Isaac departing to do Sacrifice. Pen and brown ink and red chalk on laid paper. Abraham sets off with Isaac to fulfill God's command, leaving Sarah weeping as they depart. For similar drawings in this style and format, see also Held, Rubens: Selected Drawings (1986), 186-190, 205-209. Image size: 113x93mm. The final drawing in this row is another model for an altarpiece: Flemish School, 17th Century, Christ and the Virgin crowning a female saint. Pen and ink and wash on laid paper with the fleur-de-lys watermark, early 17th century. Formerly in the collection of Dr. Hans Tauber with his stamp on the verso. Image size: 260x140mm.
Bottom row: Nicolaes Maes (Dordrecht 1634-1693 Amsterdam), The Prophet Nathan rebukes David. Pen and brown ink and wash on laid paper, c. 1650-1660. From the roof of his palace, David sees Bathsheba engaging in her ritual purification bath at the end of her period. He sends for her, seduces her, and she conceives a child. Her husband Uriah the Hittite, one of David's captains, comes home, but will not sleep with his wife while his comrades are in battle (and thus making it impossible for David's child to be passed off as his), so David orders Joab to set up a way of getting him killed in battle. After Uriah's death, David then marries Bathsheba. The situation depicted in this drawing is described in 2 Samuel 1-15. God sends the Prophet Nathan to call David back to obedience. Nathan tells David a story about a rich man who kills his neighbor's only lamb to feast a traveller even though he is rich and his many sheep of his own. David condemns the rich man to death only to have Nathan tell him, "You are the man! Maes has illustrated the moment when David cowers in fear of the Lord's wrath and repents. Our drawing is illustrated in Walter Sumowski's Drawings of the Rembrandt School, 10 vols. (NY: Abaris Books, 1979-1992), vol. 8, p. 4298-99, catalogue n. 1922x. It has also been published in William W. Robinson, Rembrandt's Sketches of Historical Subjects (1987), p. 256, fig. 22. Image size: 102x160mm. To the right, we have a 17th-century Dutch Judgment of Solomon. Pen and black ink and gray wash and pencil on laid paper. This drawing illustrates the first test of the wisdom God granted to Solomon (I kings 3: 5-28) as Solomon finds a way to discover which of the two women's claims to be the mother of a child are true. God's grant of wisdon to rulers seems to be especially significant in Protestant countries during The Thirty Years' War which led to the creation of the Dutch Republic and a period of cold war with its Catholic neighbors and its former Spanish rulers. Image size:112x177mm. In the center, we have another drawing that seems to fall within the orbit of Rembrandt's pupils and followers: Rembrandt School (mid-17th century), The Adoration of the Magi. Pen and brown ink and brown wash on laid paper, c. 1660. This drawing is the product of someone familiar with Rembrandt's loose fine-point pen drawings (see, e.g., Seymour Slive, Drawings of Rembrandt, numbers 3, 18, 27, 77, & 224). Partial watermark similar to Large City Gate. Overall appearance: very good. Image size: 172x146mm. Continuing our journey, to the right of it we have another Rembrandtish drawing: Rembrandt School (mid-17th century, Landscape with farmworker, windmill in the background. Pen and brown ink on laid paper, c. 1660. A very similar piece is shown in Drawings of the Rembrandt School, vol. 10, p. 5458, where it is attributed to Pieter de With, a painter and etcher active during the 1660s. Its similarites to a number of drawings by Rembrandt (e.g. Slive, Dover edition, numbers 62, 63, 73, 80, 126-27, 477, and 515, are apparent. Image size:159x242mm. Finally, we come to the last drawing on this wall: Jan Baptiste de Wael (Flemish, 1558-1623), Rocky Landscape with St Jerome in penitence. Pen and brown ink on cream laid paper. This work shows the transition between art whose central focus is an event in the life of a saint and art where the landscape has become the central focus. (By the way, if you haven't spotted him yet—and you probably can't unless you go to the linked page where you can see a much larger, sharper image—St. Jerome is meditating in front of a crucifix leaning against the wall of a cave in the top right of the drawing; his lion is snoozing beside him). Image size: 84x157mm.
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This wall presents seven of the etchings Kolwitz prepared for the Peasants War cycle. For full information and large photographs, please click here.
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Top: Homme, Ange, et Femme sur la Terre / Man, Angel, Woman (Cramer 99, Original etching & aquatint, 1975-76; edition 225); for full information, click here.
Bottom, from left: Sur la terre des dieux / On the gods' earth I (M. 529). Original color lithograph, 1967. 120 unsigned impressions published in the deluxe artist's book of the same title containing 12 original color lithographs; Sur la terre des dieux / On the gods' earth II (M. 530). Original color lithograph, 1967. 120 unsigned impressions published in the deluxe artist's book of the same title containing 12 original color lithographs. For full information, click here.
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Spaightwood Galleries, Inc.
To purchase, call us at 1-800-809-3343 (508-529-2511 in Upton MA & vicinity) or send an email to sptwd@verizon.net. We accept AmericanExpress, DiscoverCard, MasterCard, and Visa.
For directions and visiting information, please call. We are, of course, always available over the web and by telephone (see above for contact information). Click the following for links to past shows and artists. For a visual tour of the gallery, please click here. For information about Andy Weiner and Sonja Hansard-Weiner, please click here. For a list of special offers currently available, see Specials.
Visiting hours: Noon to six Saturdays and Sundays; other times by arrangement. Please call to confirm your visit. Browsers and guests are welcome.
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