Ludolf de Jongh(Overschie 1616-1676 Hillegersberg)A musical party
Sold for £23,040 inc. premium
Looking for a similar item?
Our Old Master Paintings specialists can help you find a similar item at an auction or via a private sale.
Find your local specialistLudolf de Jongh (Overschie 1616-1676 Hillegersberg)
oil on canvas
65.2 x 69.3cm (25 11/16 x 27 5/16in).
Footnotes
Provenance
Collection of Baron Pallandt, Overijsel, The Netherlands
Collection of Arthur C. Tate, New York
With Schaeffer Galleries, New York, 1968 (as Jacob van Loo)
Collection of John R. Blewer, Owensboro, Kentucky, USA and thence by descent to the present owner
Literature
R.E. Fleischer and S. Reiss, 'Attributions to Ludolf de Jongh: some old, some new', in The Burlington Magazine, October 1993, vol. 135, no. 1087, pp. 669-671, ill. fig.8
For many years considered to be by Jacob van Loo (Sluis 1614-1670 Paris), the present lot was recognised as a work by his near contemporary Ludolf de Jongh (Overshie 1616-1674 Hilegersberg) by Roland E. Fleischer and Stephen Reiss in their article for the Burlington Magazine in 1993 (see Literature).
The key to their attribution is based on two drawings: one in the Albertina, Vienna, of a standing figure playing the violin (inv. no. 8743) and the other in the Palais des Beaux-Arts, Lille. The former is clearly a study for the central figure in the present Musical Party and the Lille drawing shows, amongst others, a study of a young woman with her head upturned, which relates to the young woman playing the lute, lower left.
In their 1993 article, Fleischer and Reiss propose a date of around 1652 for the present lot. By this point in his career, de Jongh was well established in the city of Rotterdam and was generally known for his guardroom interiors. Fleischer and Reiss believe A Musical Party to be approximately contemporary with his Prodigal Son, now known only through a drawing by Jan Verkolje (Amsterdam 1650-1693 Delft) in the Rijksprentenkabinet.
As his native city of Rotterdam was not a major centre of art patronage, de Jongh may have been less obliged to specialise and was therefore able to turn his hand to various subjects and genres. Given his varied output, many works by de Jongh have previously been attributed to his other, more famous contemporaries. His depictions of interiors can range, for example, from the enclosed, dark, windowless rooms of soldiers, in the style of Palamedesz, to the light-filled, elegant interiors in the vein of the Delft painters of the 1660s.
