A seated woman in spectacles reading by candlelight

Details

Attributed to Aert de Gelder (Dordrecht 1645-1727)
A seated woman in spectacles reading by candlelight
pen and wash exercises (verso)
pen and brown ink, brown wash, brown ink framing lines on three sides
107 x 79 mm.

Provenance

Sir Thomas Lawrence (L. 2445), whose collection of Rembrandt drawings was bought after his death from Samuel Woodburn by Esdaile.
W. Esdaile (L. 2617); possibly Christie's, London, 17 June 1840, lot 80 (an old woman reading, bistre) (£1.13s to Bray, with lot 81).
Possibly Louis Galichon.
Tobias Christ.
Victor Koch; Christie's, London, 18 April 1967, lot 149, as School of Rembrandt (to Brod).
Prof. E. Perman; Sotheby Mak van Waay, Amsterdam, 18 November 1980, lot 106, as Philips Koninck (to Dreesmann).
Dr Anton C.R. Dreesmann (inventory no. B-99).

Literature

E. Bock and J. Rosenberg, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin. Die Zeichnungen Niederländischer Meister, Berlin, 1930, p. 233, under no. 2689 (as doubtful whether by Rembrandt).
W. Sumowski, Drawings of the Rembrandt School, III, New York, 1980, no. 594xx (as Abraham van Dyck).

Exhibited

Notre Dame, Indiana, The Snite Museum of Art, Selections of XVII and XVIII Century Dutch Art from the Collection of Dr A.C.R. Dreesmann, 1982, no. 20.

Special notice

No VAT will be charged on the hammer price, but VAT at 17.5% will be added to the buyer's premium which is invoiced on a VAT inclusive basis.

Lot Essay

Comparable to a drawing attributed to Aert de Gelder in the Louvre, which shows similar use of roughly parallel thick hatching and similar regular strokes of 'dry' wash along the sleeve, W. Sumowski, Drawings of the Rembrandt School, 5, New York, 1981, no. 1054x. That sheet is dated by Professor Sumowski to circa 1661-5.
Another drawing by the same hand as the present drawing is in the Kupferstichkabinett, Berlin, W. Sumowski, op. cit., no. 593xx, which he also attributed to Abraham van Dyck.

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