Rijksmuseum

Object data

pen and brown ink, with grey wash; framing line in brown ink

height 77 mm × width 78 mm

Inscriptions

signed and dated on verso: lower left, in red chalk, S. de Bray 1628
inscribed on verso: lower left, in pencil, No..; lower left, by Goll von Franckenstein, in brown ink, N 3634 (L. 2987)
stamped on verso: upper left, twice, with the mark of the Vereniging Rembrandt (L. 2135); below that, with the mark of the museum (L. 2228)

Provenance

…; Jonkheer Johan Edler Goll von Franckenstein (1722-85), Amsterdam and Velsen (L. 2987); his son, Jonkheer Johan Goll van Franckenstein (1756-1821), Amsterdam and Velzen; his son, Jonkheer Pieter Hendrik Goll van Franckenstein (1787-1832); sale, Jonkheer Johan Goll van Franckenstein, Amsterdam (De Vries et al.), l July 1833 sqq., Album VV, one of four in no. 2, fl. 2, to ‘De Vries’; Jacob de Vos Jbzn (1803-78), Amsterdam; his widow, Abrahamina Henrietta de Vos-Wurfbain (1808-83), Amsterdam; sale, Jacob de Vos Jbzn, Amsterdam (C.F. Roos et al.), 22 May 1883 sqq., as Thiery de Bray, with RP-T-1884-A-291 in no. 81, fl. 110 to ‘Rembrandt’ for the Vereniging Rembrandt; from whom acquired by the museum (L. 2228), 1884

Object number: RP-T-1884-A-290

Credit line: Purchased with the support of the Vereniging Rembrandt

The artist

Salomon de Bray (Amsterdam 1597 – 1664 Haarlem)

Salomon de Bray was a painter, draughtsman, designer, urban planner, architect and poet, active in Haarlem. He was born in Amsterdam to Simon Jansz de Bray (c. 1563/64-?), a Flemish immigrant, and his wife Maritge Jan Bettendr (c. 1569-?). Salomon settled in Haarlem at an early age. He is first recorded there in 1616 as a musketeer with the Kloveniers and as a member of the Rederijkerskamer 'De Wijngaertranken'.¹

Although his artistic training is undocumented, it is assumed that De Bray was a pupil of Cornelis Cornelisz van Haarlem (1562-1638) and Hendrick Goltzius (1558-1617), two of the foremost artists of Haarlem. He was admitted to the Guild of St Luke in 1630 and was involved in its reorganisation in 1631. During the period 1632-41, De Bray was a member of the Guild’s executive committee and was twice appointed dean.²

In 1625 Salomon de Bray had married Anna Westerbaen (1605-1663). Three of their sons became artists: Jan de Bray (c. 1626/27-97), Dirck de Bray (c. 1635-94) and Joseph de Bray (c. 1628/34-64). All were involved in the family workshop, where it appears they maintained a close working relationship.³ Salomon died of the plague in 1664. The same fate was met by four of his children, including the budding artist Joseph.⁴

As a painter De Bray practised a variety of genres, including landscape, genre, portraiture and history scenes. His oeuvre shows an artist who was continuously receptive to new artistic developments.⁵ In his earliest known works, the influence of Goltzius and Cornelisz van Haarlem is apparent, supporting the assumption that either may have been his teacher.⁶ Equally, his landscapes and history pictures show a distinct awareness of the work of Pieter Lastman (1583-1633), suggesting that the artist at some point may have trained with someone active in Amsterdam circle of pre-Rembrandtists.⁷ Lastman’s influence is most apparent in the spatial arrangements of De Bray’s pictures and in the use of diffuse lighting, can be seen, for instance, in Christ on Mount Olive in the Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister, Kassel (inv. no. GK 254).

In the mid-1630s, De Bray was attracted to the work of the Utrecht Caravaggisti, adopting their bright colouring and compositional strategies and, most importantly, their characteristic naturalism (e.g. Jael with the Prophetess Debora and Barak in Museum Catharijneconvent, Utrecht, inv. no. RMCC s121).⁸ In 1649-51 the painter-architect Jacob van Campen (1596-1657) approached De Bray for prestigious commission to decorate the Oranjezaal at Huis ten Bosch. For his two monumental paintings, De Bray adapted Flemish tendencies of Jacob Jordaens (1593-1678).⁹ The influence of Jordaens continued in subsequent years, imposing a classicist and monumental air to his compositions. In the last stage of his career, De Bray returned to pictorial tradition of Lastman and other Amsterdam pre-Rembrandtists.¹⁰

De Bray’s portraits and genre scenes show his full artistic maturity from the mid-1630s onward, as is well illustrated by the charming Portrait of a Woman in Profile_) of 1636, now in the Van Otterloo collection. Influences from his fellow townsmen Frans Hals (c. 1582/83-1666) and Pieter de Grebber (c. 1600-c. 1652/53), as well as Caesar van Everdingen (c. 1616/17-1678), are apparent in such works as Girl Combing her Hair in the Louvre, Paris (inv. no. RF 1995 3). His portraits from the 1650s and 1660s, in turn, reveal contemporary developments from such popular Amsterdam portraitists as Bartholomeus van der Helst (1613-1670) and Ferdinand Bol (1616-1680).¹¹

As a draughtsman, black and red chalk were Salomon’s preferred media for figure studies and portraits. Many compositional studies survive for historical and religious scenes, occasionally directly related to extant paintings, for instance his signed and dated_Judith and Holofernes_ of 1636 in the Städtische Wessenberg-Gemäldegalerie, Konstanz (inv. no. 42/162),¹² which served as a preliminary study for the painting in the Museo del Prado, Madrid (inv. no. P002097).¹³

De Bray’s workshop practice involved making ricordi or drawn copies of his paintings. Various such carefully executed drawings by both Salomon and his three sons have survived, attesting to the close working relationship among the family members. This copying practice apparently was considered important in the formation of a kind of archive that could serve as a record of past projects and as source material for future commissions of prospective clients.¹⁴

Apart from the visual arts, De Bray also engaged in architecture and urban planning. In 1631 he published a collection of engravings, supplied with commentary, of the most important buildings by Hendrik de Keyser under the title Architectura moderna. Among his architectural activities were contributions to a plan for the enlargement of the city of Haarlem, and drawings for modifications to the city’s Nieuwe Kerk.

Saskia van Altena, 2021

References
A. Houbraken, De groote schouburgh der Nederlantsche konstschilders en schilderessen, 3 vols., Amsterdam 1718-21, I (1718), pp. 175-77; A.J. van der Aa, Aardrijkskundig woordenboek der Nederlanden, 13 vols., Gorinchem 1839-51, II (1855), p. 1203; A. von Wurzbach, Niederländisches Künstlerlexikon, 3 vols., Vienna/Leipzig 1906-11, I (1906), pp. 175-76, III (1911), p. 39; U. Thieme and F. Becker, Allgemeines Lexikon der bildenden Künstler: Von der Antike bis zur Gegenwart, 37 vols., Leipzig 1907-50, IV (1910), pp. 555-56; J.W. von Moltke, ‘Salomon de Bray’, Marburger Jahrbuch für Kunstwissenschaft 11/12 (1938-39), pp. 309-420; A. van der Marel, ‘De kunstschilders De Bray en hun familie’, De Nederlandsche Leeuw 81 (1964), pp. 6-26; E.R.M. Taverne, ‘Salomon de Bray’s ontwerp voor de drinkhoorn van Het Loffelijke Gilde van St. Hubert te Haarlem’, Nederlands Kunsthistorisch Jaarboek 23 (1972), pp. 251-72; E.R.M. Taverne, ‘Salomon de Braij and the Reorganization of the Haarlem Guild in 1631’, Simiolus 6 (1972-73), pp. 50-69; F. Lammertse, ‘Salomon de Braij’ [biographical part], in A. Blankert et al., Hollands classicisme in de zeventiende-eeuwse schilderkunst, exh. cat. Rotterdam (Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen)/Frankfurt-am-Main (Städelsches Kunstinstitut) 1999-2000, pp. 84-87; J. Giltaij and F. Lammertse, ‘Maintaining a Studio Archive: Drawn Copies by the De Braij Family’, Master Drawings 39 (2001), no. 4, pp. 367-94; J.W. von Moltke, ‘De Bray family’ (2003), Grove Art Online, https://doi.org/10.1093/gao/9781884446054.article.T011005; I. van Thiel-Stroman, ‘Biographies 15th-17th century’, in P. Biesboer et al., Painting in Haarlem, 1500-1850: The Collection of the Frans Hals Museum, coll. cat. Haarlem 2006, pp. 120-23; P. Biesboer (ed.), Salomon, Jan, Joseph en Dirck de Bray. Vier schilders in één gezin, exh. cat. Haarlem (Frans Hals Museum)/London (Dulwich Picture Gallery) 2008; RKD Artists, https://rkd.nl/explore/artists/12196, accessed 29 June 2021

Entry

When this drawing and inv. no. RP-T-1884-A-291 – both illustrating scenes from inside a bookseller’s shop – were in the collection of the Goll van Franckenstein family, they were together with a pair of sheets, also by Salomon de Bray, in the British Museum, London (inv. nos. 1895,0915.1131) and 1895,0915.1132), both of which represent a framemaker’s shop.¹⁵ Both London sheets are dated 1646 6/4 (i.e. 4 June 1646),¹⁶ and are the same height but wider than the Amsterdam drawings, one of which is dated 1628. There is a very similar inscribed date in Salomon’s hand, 1646 8/12 on the drawing of Clara and Albert de Bray Asleep in their Cradle in the Morgan Library & Museum, New York (inv. no. III, 176).¹⁷

The present drawing shows a boy stitching a book in a sewing frame. The items leaning against the counter in the foreground are, from left to right, a book in a blocking press, a knocking-up stone with the hammer on top and an empty blocking press. Stacked on the shelves are books, packets of unbound books or blank paper, and globes. In this drawing the customers are standing in front of framed works of art on the wall, while in the companion sheet, inv. no. RP-T-1884-A-291, they are examining loose works on paper, probably prints. Heijbroek (1984) suggested that the bookshop was in Haarlem. The scene was not drawn from life, but presents a representative sample of the wares sold in shops of this kind.

The purpose of the pairs of drawings in the Rijksmuseum and the British Museum is unknown, but the Amsterdam sheets may have been designs for woodcuts. This is suggested by a drawing of 1627 by De Bray in the Kupferstichkabinett, Berlin (KdZ 3993),¹⁸ which is in a similar style and was the design for a printer’s mark executed by an anonymous woodcutter. It consists of a bookpress standing in a room, and is set in an oval with the Haarlem coat of arms above.

Peter Schatborn, 1998

Citation

(accessed 9 December 2025 00:36:56).