Rijksmuseum

Object data

pen and brown ink, point of brush and grey ink, with grey wash, over graphite; framing line in brown ink

height 284 mm × width 384 mm

Inscriptions

signed: lower right, in brown ink, F: de Moucheron. fecit
inscribed on verso: centre, in nineteenth-century or modern hand, in pencil, 63; lower left, by Goll von Franckenstein, in reddish brown ink, 2627. (L. 2987); lower right, in an eighteenth-century hand, in pencil, partially concealed, 2481; below that, in an eighteenth- or nineteenth-century hand, in brown ink, In Savoije by Grenoble
stamped on verso: lower left, with the mark of J. de Vos Jbzn (L. 1450); lower centre, with the mark of the museum (L. 2228)

Technical notes

watermark: Strasbourg lily, with letters WR; cf. Heawood, no. 1796 (Schieland: 1616), counter mark IHS with a cross

Provenance

…; collection Valerius Röver (1686-1739), Delft;¹ his widow, Cornelia Röver-van der Dussen (1689-1762), Delft;² from whom en bloc, fl. 20,500, through the mediation of the dealer H. de Leth, to Johann Edler Goll von Franckenstein (1722-85), Amsterdam and Velsen (L. 2987)³; …; sale, Nicolaes Tjark (1694-1762, Leiden), Amsterdam (H. de Leth), 10 November 1762, no. 238, fl. 10, to the ‘J. de Bosch’, Amsterdam;⁴ …; ? sale, Pieter de Haan (1723-66, Amsterdam) and anonymous, Amsterdam (H. de Winter et al.), 9 March 1767, Album K, in no. 882, with sixteen other drawings, fl. 1:8:- for all, to ‘Troost’;⁵ … collection Jacob de Vos Jbzn (1803-1882), Amsterdam (L. 1450); 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., no. 327, fl. 135, to the dealer R.W.P. de Vries, Amsterdam;⁶ from whom, fl. 151.87, through mediation of the Vereniging Rembrandt, to the museum (L. 2228)

Object number: RP-T-1886-A-620

Credit line: Purchased with the support of the Vereniging Rembrandt

Entry

As is stated by the inscription on the verso, the present drawing represents a view in Savoy near Grenoble. The river seen in the background is the Isère, which also features in a drawing by the artist in the National Galleries of Scotland, Edinburgh (inv. no. RSA 83).⁷ In terms of both style and location, the present sheet is associated with the group of some thirty landscape drawings that Frederik de Moucheron made in the Chartreuse mountains, north of the city of Grenoble. Exactly when he travelled in that region is documented by one of these sheets, the Landscape near the Grand Chartreuse in the Hamburger Kunsthalle Hamburg (inv. no. 22204), which is dated 1656.

The present drawing differs stylistically from the Hamburg sheet, suggesting a later date, probably after the artist’s return to the Netherlands, as was likely also the case with inv. no. RP-T-1905-85. Stylistically closer to this View near Grenoble is the Roman Castle of Francheville near Lyon, dated 1669, in the Atlas Van der Hem in the Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, Vienna (inv. no. 00485299).⁸ Both drawings, though belonging to the same kind, do not share the provenance. The present sheet once belonged to Valerius Röver who recorded it in his manuscript catalogue of circa 1730/39.⁹): ‘Een gebergte en boomen na ´t leven in Savoÿe bij Grenoble, met de pen en gewassen van de oude Moucheron 3:-’); cf. also H.-U. Beck, ‘Anmerkungen zu den Zeichnungssammlungen von Valerius Röver und Goll van Franckenstein’, Nederlands Kunsthistorisch Jaarboek 32 (1981), pp. 111-25.] The Röver provenance excludes the possibility suggested by E. de Groot¹⁰ and by S. Alsteens and H. Buijs¹¹ that the present sheet was part of the group of Chartreuse drawings in the collection of Laurens van der Hem that became part of the collections of Hendrik van der Vught (sale, Amsterdam, 17 April 1745) and Hendrik Tersmitten (sale, Amsterdam, 23 September 1754 sqq.). Inv. no. RP-T-1905-85, on the other hand, bears an inscription by Laurens van der Hem and may be traced back to the latter’s collection. Apparently, not all French views by De Moucheron were part of Van der Hem’s collection. After having returned from his travels, De Moucheron doubtless exploited his drawn souvenirs in various ways for other patrons.

A closely related view, with only minor differences in detail, in the Special Collections, Universiteit Leiden (inv. no. PK-T-AW-1251),¹² bears an old attribution to De Moucheron, doubtless based on its inscription ‘F Moucheron Fecit. However, this ‘signature’ is now assumed by Peter Schatborn to be false, and the sheet has been recently reattributed by him to Jan Worst (active c. 1645-60), whom De Moucheron must have met in France.¹³

Annemarie Stefes, 2019

Literature

H.-U. Beck, ‘Anmerkungen zu den Zeichnungssammlungen von Valerius Röver und Goll van Franckenstein’, Nederlands Kunsthistorisch Jaarboek 32 (1981), p. 121, 124 (n. 20); M. Schapelhouman, Het beste bewaard. Een Amsterdamse verzameling en het ontstaan van de Vereniging Rembrandt, exh. cat. Amsterdam (Rijksprentenkabinet) 1983, no. 69; K. Andrews, Catalogue of Netherlandish Drawings in the National Gallery of Scotland, 2 vols., coll. cat. Edinburgh 1985, I, p. 55; M. Schapelhouman and P. Schatborn, Land & water. Hollandse tekeningen uit de 17de eeuw in het Rijksprentenkabinet/Land & Water: Dutch Drawings from the 17th Century in the Rijksmuseum Print Room, exh. cat. Amsterdam (Rijksprentenkabinet) 1987, no. 85; E. de Groot, The World of a Seventeenth-Century Collector: The Atlas Blaeu-Van der Hem, ‘t Goy-Houten 2006, p. 132 (n. 38; as from Van der Vugt’s album); S. Alsteens and H. Buijs, Paysages de France dessinés par Lambert Doomer et les artistes hollandais et flamands des XVIe et XVIIe siècles, Paris 2008, pp. 291, 297, no. 89 (as probably from Van der Vugt’s album); R. Priem et al., L’Age d’Or hollandais de Rembrandt à Vermeer avec les trésors du Rijksmuseum, exh. cat. Paris (Pinacothèque de Paris) 2009-10, no. 63 (entry by M. Schapelhouman); A. Stefes, Niederländische Zeichnungen, 1450-1800, 3 vols., coll. cat. Hamburg 2011 (Die Sammlungen der Hamburger Kunsthalle, Kupferstichkabinett, vol. 2), II, p. 394, under no. 692 (n. 2); P. Schatborn, 'Drawings by Jan Worst', Master Drawings 58 (2020), no. 1, pp. 64-65 (fig. 62)

Citation

A. Stefes, 2019, 'Frederik de Moucheron, View near Grenoble, Amsterdam, c. 1669', in J. Turner (ed.), (under construction) Drawings 2, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: https://data.rijksmuseum.nl/200142856

(accessed 18 December 2025 11:44:35).