The departure of the young Tobias

Details

Ferdinand Bol (Dordrecht 1616-1680 Amsterdam)
The departure of the young Tobias
pen and brown ink, brown wash, watermark device
7 7/8 x 11 7/8 in. (19.9 x 30.2 cm.)

Provenance

with Edward Speelman, London.
Wilhelm Reinhold Valentiner, bequeathed to the
North Carolina Museum of Art; Sotheby's, New York, 27 January 1999, lot 69.
with Spink-Leger, London, 2000.

Literature

W.R. Valentiner, 'Drawings by Bol', The Detroit Institute of Arts, Art Quarterly, XX, 1957, pp. 59, 62, fig. 17.
The Detroit Institute of Arts, Art Quarterly, XXVI, no. 2, summer 1963, p. 258, illus.
'Acquisitions', North Carolina Museum of Art Biennial Report Issue, VI, no. 4; VII, no. 1, 1963-5, pp. 56, 80, fig. 15.
C. Vestal Brown, North Carolina Museum of Art. A catalogue of drawings and watercolours, Raleigh, 1969, no. 9.
T. Gerzi, 'Etudes sur les dessins des élèves de Rembrandt', Bulletin du Musée Hongrois des Beaux Arts, 1971, p. 104, nos. 104, 106.
G. Sciolla, 'Disegni rembrandtiana a Torino', Critica d'Arte, XIX, 1972, p. 64.
W. Wegner, Die Niederländischen Handzeichnungen des 15.-18. Jahrunderts, Katalogue der Staatlichen Graphischen Sammlung, München, 1973, I, p. 178, under no. 1218.
D.M. Tsurutani, The etching of Ferdinand Bol, 1974, p. 3, fig. 4.
H. Weskott, Die Darstellung de Tobiasgeschichte, Munich, 1987, p. 103.
W. Sumowski, Drawings of the Rembrandt School, New York, 1979, I, p. 554, no. 265, illus.

Exhibited

Hartford, Wadsworth Atheneum, 1950-1951.
Raleigh, North Carolina Museum of Art, Rembrandt and his pupils, 1956, no. 9 (as The Prodigal Son).

Brought to you by

Jennifer Wright

jwright@christies.com +1 212 636 2384

Lot Essay

Dated by Sumowski to the second half of the 1640s (Sumowski, op. cit., p. 554), after the artist left Rembrandt's workshop. Sumowski compares this sheet to Abraham entertaining the angels and Abraham meeting the angels (op. cit., pp. 494-95; pp. 554-55, nos. 235x, 264x). Bol depicted a later scene from the life of Tobit (Tob. 10, 11, and 12) in a slightly smaller sheet (16.5 x 26.7 cm.), Tobias taking leave of Raguel (Sotheby's, London, 4 July 2012, lot 102; op. cit., no216x). There are no documented paintings of the life of Tobias by Bol.

This drawing was formerly in the collection of Wilhelm Reinhold Valentiner (1880-1958), the esteemed art historian, curator, and museum director. In 1906 he published his dissertation on Rembrandt, and later became the first director the North Carolina Museum of Art in Raleigh from 1955 until his death. He bequeathed this drawing to the museum.

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