A winter landscape with peasants skating and playing kolf on a frozen river, a town beyond

细节

Circle of Pieter Breughel II (Brussels 1564/5-Antwerp 1637/8)
A winter landscape with peasants skating and playing kolf on a frozen river, a town beyond
oil on copper
11¼ x 13 5/8 in. (28.6 x 34.5 cm.)

来源

In the family of the present owner since the 19th Century.

注意事项

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.

拍品专文

The composition is closely based on a lost drawing by Hans Bol. In 1570, a year after the death Pieter Brueghel I, Hieronymous Cock published a series of four engravings depicting The Four Seasons commissioned by Brueghel after drawings on which was working. His drawings of Spring, dated 1565, and Summer, dated 1568, are both in the Albertina. However, he was unable to complete all four drawings before his death and Cock turned to Hans Bol to supply those for Autumn and Winter in time to publish his engravings in 1570. Neither of Bol's drawings survive.

The present picture is an addition to the versions of this composition by Pieter Brueghel II and his studio recorded by Klaus Ertz (Pieter Brueghel der Jüngere, Lingen, 1999/2000, II, pp. 601-4, nos. 665-81). Of those, it relates closest to the only other version on copper (and of approximately the same size), that in the Musée de Grenoble (ibid. no. A678), which although not seen in the original, Ertz does not consider to be autograph. Marlier suggested an attribution for the Grenoble picture to Jan Brueghel I on account of the copper support (G. Marlier, Pierre Brueghel Le Jeune, Brussels, 1969, p. 238, no. 4).