Marten Rijckaert (Antwerp 1587-1631)
PROPERTY FROM A PRIVATE EUROPEAN COLLECTION
Marten Rijckaert (Antwerp 1587-1631)

A wooded landscape with Hercules and Cacus; and A mountainous river landscape with the Prodigal Son

Details
Marten Rijckaert (Antwerp 1587-1631)
A wooded landscape with Hercules and Cacus; and A mountainous river landscape with the Prodigal Son
oil on copper
11 x 14¾ in. (27.5 x 37.4 cm.)
two
Provenance
Private collection, France.
Private collection, Germany.
Literature
These previously unpublished landscapes have been examined firsthand by Dr. Luuk Pijl, who endorses the attribution to Marten Rijckaert (written communication, 12 November 2011). The scion of a dynasty of Antwerp painters, Marten Rickaert was the son of David Rijckaert I and uncle to David Rijckaert II. In 1630, he sat for Anthony van Dyck, whose portrait of him is today in the Prado, Madrid.

Dr. Pijl has also identified the subject of the present coppers. The first depicts the legend of Hercules and Cacus, a rare appearance in Northern European art, though it is the subject of a famous woodcut of 1588 by Hendrick Goltzius. The story, from Ovid, tells that during his tenth Labor Hercules killed the fire-breathing monster Cacus who had been terrorizing local cattle. The second work shows the Prodigal Son, as recounted in Luke 15:11-32, who has squandered his inheritance and found himself alone in the wilderness.
Sale room notice
Please note the following additional provenance for this lot:

(Probably) Antoine I de Grimaldi, Prince of Monaco (1701-1715), and by inheritance to his stepson, Jacques I de Matignon, comte de Torigny and duc de Valentinois (1689-1751), later Jacques de  Grimaldi, Prince of Monaco, and by descent to his son,

Honoré III de Grimaldi, Prince of Monaco, Duke of Valintinois (1720-1795), by 1736, at the Hôtel Matignon, rue de Varenne, Paris, as Paul Brill (according to an inscription dated 1736, on the reverse of both panels).

The Hôtel Matignon is the official residence of the Prime Minister of France.

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Joshua Glazer
Joshua Glazer

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