Bartholomeus Breenbergh Deventer 1598-1657 Amsterdam

Elisha and the children

Details

Bartholomeus Breenbergh Deventer 1598-1657 Amsterdam
Elisha and the children
oil on panel
16¼ x 21 in. (41.3 x 53.3 cm.)

Provenance

M. Coppens, Eindhoven.

Literature

M. Roethlisberger, Bartholomeus Breenbergh: The Paintings, Berlin, 1981, p. 75, no. 188, illustrated.
M. Roethlisberger, in the exhibition catalogue, Bartholomeus Breenbergh, New York, 1991, no. 19, illustrated.

Exhibited

New York, Richard L. Feigen & Co., Bartholomeus Breenbergh, 18 September-31 October 1991, no. 19; and London, 18 November-20 December 1991.
Sarasota, The John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art, Time and Transformation in 17th Century Dutch Art, 20 August-30 October 2005; and The Speed Art Museum, Louisville, 10 January-26 March 2006.

Lot Essay

The present painting depicts an event in the life of the prophet Elisha, as recounted in Kings 2: 23-25. Elisha encountered a group of small boys, who jeered at him. He turned and 'cursed them in the name of the Lord', and caused two she-bears to come out of the woods and attack the boys.

Although this story is uncommon in seventeenth-century Dutch art, Breenbergh painted it again in 1633 (Kunsthalle, Bremen). The warm tonality of the present painting suggests that it was executed about a decade later than the Bremen picture, thus dating to circa 1643.

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