Object data
watercolour, with opaque watercolour and silver ink, over traces of graphite
height 222 mm × width 333 mm
Pieter Withoos
c. 1680 - c. 1692
Inscriptions
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signed: lower right, ink black ink, P:W:fe:
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inscribed on verso, in pencil: lower left, possibly by I.F. Ellinckhuysen (1814-1897, Rotterdam), P Withoos (‘Wit’ reinforced); lower right, 313
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stamped: lower centre, with the mark of the museum (L. 2228)
Technical notes
watermark: Strasbourg lily; similar to Heawood, no. 1786 (Holland: c. 1690)
Condition
Light foxing throughout
Provenance
…; collection, Ignatius Franciscus Ellinckhuysen (1814-97), Rotterdam (? L. 3008.); his sale, Amsterdam (F. Muller and C.M. van Gogh), 16 April 1879 sqq., no. 328 (‘Papillons et mouches. - signé. A l’aquarelle. - H. 33, L. 28’);1 sale, Georg Carl Valentin Schöffer (1841-1915, Amsterdam and Scheveningen), Amsterdam (F. Muller), 30 May 1893 sqq., no. 484 (‘Papillons et insectes. Aquarelle. - Signée. Hauteur 33, largeur 28 cent.’), fl. 11, to the dealer R.P.W. de Vries (Amsterdam);2 from whom, fl. 11, to the museum (L. 2228), 1900
Object number: RP-T-1900-A-4433
Copyright: Public domain
The artist
Pieter Withoos (Amersfoort 1654/55 - Amsterdam 1692)
He was the son of the Amersfoort painter Matthias Withoos (1627-1703) and Wendelina van Hoorn (1618-c. 1680). He and several of his siblings were trained by their father.3 The family moved to Hoorn in 1672, but Pieter returned to Amersfoort one year later. He married Maria van Oldebarnevelt (?-?), the daughter of a prominent Amersfoort family.4 In Amersfoort, Pieter cleaned the paintings that hung in the town hall.
Pieter and his family moved to the Nieuwstraat in Utrecht around 1686.5 According to Houbraken, Pieter painted flowers and animals in watercolour that were bound in albums, just like his father.6 Pieter and his sister Alida Withoos (1661-1730) were invited by Agnes Block (1629-1704) to draw and paint the flowers and birds in the garden of her estate ‘Vijverhof’ in Loenen aan de Vecht, near Utrecht. It is likely that he stayed there in 1687, the same year as his sister. Pieter made several contributions to Block’s ‘bloemenboeken’ (flower albums) and was the main contributor to her ‘Vogelboek’ (Book of birds).7 Later in his life, Pieter moved to Amsterdam and died there on 23 April 1692.
Carolyn Mensing, 2020
References
A. Houbraken, De groote schouburgh der Nederlantsche konstschilders en schilderessen, 3 vols., Amsterdam 1718-21, II (1719), p. 189; A. von Wurzbach, Niederländisches Künstlerlexikon, 3 vols., Vienna/Leipzig 1906-11, III (1911), p. 893; U. Thieme and F. Becker, Allgemeines Lexikon der bildenden Künstler: Von der Antike bis zur Gegenwart, 37 vols., Leipzig 1907-50, XXXVI (1947), p. 117; A. van der Willigen and F.G. Meijer, A Dictionary of Dutch and Flemish Still-life Painters Working in Oils, 1525-1725, Leiden 2003, p. 222; M.W. Heijenga-Klomp, ‘Matthias Withoos (ca. 1627-1703) en zijn kinderen. Een Amersfoortse schildersfamilie’, Flehite, Historisch Jaarboek voor Amersfoort en omstreken (2005), pp. 124-28
Entry
In a similar manner as in inv. nos. RP-T-1951-328 and RP-T-1951-329, Pieter Withoos created a well-balanced composition by arranging the butterflies and insects according to size and colour – placing the blue and yellow-orange butterflies together. These sheets do not have any scientific pretentions and are purely decorative.
Carolyn Mensing, 2020
Citation
(accessed 13 December 2025 01:12:35).