Neptune calming the waves, after Rubens

This large and powerful study, executed in the combination of red and black chalk favoured by Rubens in many of his most sophisticated drawings, is based on the central figure of the master’s large canvas, now at the Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister in Dresden (inv. 964 B), originally produced for one of the triumphal arches for the entry of Cardinal-Infante Ferdinand in Antwerp in 1635 (fig. 1; see Martin, op. cit., no. 3, fig. 7). While the imposing figure of Neptune amongst groups of sea nymphs and hippocampi takes up the foreground of the composition, its true subject should be sought in the background, where Prince Ferdinand’s ship is seen travelling from Barcelona to Genoa. No drawing still accepted as by Rubens for the composition is known today, but a spirited oil sketch is at the Harvard Art Museums, Cambridge, Massachusetts inv. 1942.174 (Martin, op. cit., no. 3a, figs. 8,9). Several other drawings after the composition exist, notably a pen sketch of Neptune at the Rijksmuseum (inv. RP-T-1927-67) and a finished chalk study of the entire composition at the British Museum (inv. 1893,0731.23), both given to Theodoor van Thulden, who executed the print of the arch’s decoration in an illustrated account of Ferdinand’s entry, published in 1642 under the title Pompa introitus Ferdinandi; and a weaker but also contemporary copy of the composition in black chalk at the Albertina, Vienna (inv. 8234). Neither in quality nor size, they compete with the work presented here, which may be identical to sheets in the famed Crozat and Lempereur collections (see Provenance), described in the catalogue of the sale of the latter as done ‘aux trois crayons’ and at the time considered Rubens’s original study for the figure in his painting.


Fig. 1. Peter Paul Rubens and workshop, Neptune ruling the waves, with the Voyage of Prince Ferdinand from Barcelona to Genoa. Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden.