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Lot Essay
Following his training with the Amsterdam artists David Colijns and Claes Cornelisz. Moeyaert, Salomon Koninck became a master in the Amsterdam Guild of Saint Luke in 1632. Though Koninck does not appear to have ever personally studied with Rembrandt, his works nevertheless confirm his familiarity with the greatest of all Dutch masters' works. Like Rembrandt, Koninck’s paintings are characterized by an interest in a relatively restricted palette and strong light effects. Moreover, the lion’s share of Koninck’s works, including the present painting, can be described as tronies, a genre that likewise resonated with Rembrandt in the period. Unlike formal portraits, which were produced on commission and with the intention that the sitter be identifiable to the viewer, tronies were painted for the open market as studies of expression or facial types.
The elderly bearded man in this painting is probably based on a live model. His wizened face can likewise be identified in several other paintings, including Koninck’s An old man cutting his nails, dating to circa 1640 and today in the Musée des Beaux-Arts, Rennes (see W. Sumowski, op. cit., no. 1107). The man’s long beard and velvet cap suggest that he is a scholar studiously at work in his kantoor, or office. The intensity with which he sharpens his quill is conveyed not only through his fixated gaze but, rather charmingly, the modest bowl of porridge that he allows to cool along the table’s edge. Koninck similarly employed the motif of a scholar evidently too absorbed in his studies to eat in a painting dated 1641 in the collection of the Marquess of Bath at Longleat (ibid., no. 1132).
When Werner Sumowski first published this painting, he erroneously associated it with a painting that featured at the second sale of works recently restituted to the heirs of Adolphe Schloss, held at Galerie Charpentier on 5 December 1951 (loc. cit.). In fact, the painting in the 1951 sale was another thematically similar work by Koninck, also looted from the Schloss collection and today in the Museo Nacional del Prado, Madrid. Upon the seizure of the present painting in 1943, it was earmarked for the planned Führermuseum in Linz. Having been out of public view and in the same private collection for nearly seventy years, in 2019 it was restituted to the heirs of Adolphe Schloss.
The elderly bearded man in this painting is probably based on a live model. His wizened face can likewise be identified in several other paintings, including Koninck’s An old man cutting his nails, dating to circa 1640 and today in the Musée des Beaux-Arts, Rennes (see W. Sumowski, op. cit., no. 1107). The man’s long beard and velvet cap suggest that he is a scholar studiously at work in his kantoor, or office. The intensity with which he sharpens his quill is conveyed not only through his fixated gaze but, rather charmingly, the modest bowl of porridge that he allows to cool along the table’s edge. Koninck similarly employed the motif of a scholar evidently too absorbed in his studies to eat in a painting dated 1641 in the collection of the Marquess of Bath at Longleat (ibid., no. 1132).
When Werner Sumowski first published this painting, he erroneously associated it with a painting that featured at the second sale of works recently restituted to the heirs of Adolphe Schloss, held at Galerie Charpentier on 5 December 1951 (loc. cit.). In fact, the painting in the 1951 sale was another thematically similar work by Koninck, also looted from the Schloss collection and today in the Museo Nacional del Prado, Madrid. Upon the seizure of the present painting in 1943, it was earmarked for the planned Führermuseum in Linz. Having been out of public view and in the same private collection for nearly seventy years, in 2019 it was restituted to the heirs of Adolphe Schloss.