Lot Essay
The present picture is based on the slightly smaller painting executed c.1618 by Rubens with the assistance of Van Dyck, once in the collection of Sir Robert Walpole at Houghton and now in the Hermitage (M. Varshavskaya, Rubens' Paintings in the Hermitage Museum, Leningrad, 1975, pp. 122-7, no. 18, illustrated, and colour pls. 16-18; M. Jaffé, Rubens. Catalogo completo, Milan, 1989, pp. 243-4, no. 508, illustrated). Van Dyck's contribution to that picture consisted of at least the heads of two of the apostles seated on Christ's right, which follow oil studies by Van Dyck himself (E. Larsen, The Paintings of Anthony van Dyck, Freren, 1988, nos. 100 and 136, I, pp. 187 and 405, figs. 119 and 450) rather than Rubens' oil sketch in the Akademie, Vienna (J.S. Held, The Oil Sketches of Peter Paul Rubens, Princeton, 1980, I, pp. 464-5, no. 337; II, pl. 329); a third head relates to an oil sketch also given to Van Dyck by Jaffé and Larsen (op. cit., no. 137, I, p. 188, fig. 121) but tentatively accepted by Held as the work of Rubens.
The present picture is a very free copy of the Hermitage canvas, showing Simon the Pharisee wearing a patterned rather than a plain cloak and a basket rather than a bowl of fruit on the table, and with numerous variations in the poses of the figures. The most notable changes made by the painter of the present picture are the heads, most of which are completely different from those in both the Hermitage canvas and the Vienna sketch
The present picture is a very free copy of the Hermitage canvas, showing Simon the Pharisee wearing a patterned rather than a plain cloak and a basket rather than a bowl of fruit on the table, and with numerous variations in the poses of the figures. The most notable changes made by the painter of the present picture are the heads, most of which are completely different from those in both the Hermitage canvas and the Vienna sketch