Object data
oil on panel
support: height 67.6 cm × width 53.3 cm
outer size: depth 6 cm (support incl. frame)
Hans Bollongier
Still Life with Flowers
1639
Inscriptions
- signature and date, bottom right (H and B ligated): HBoulenger. / 1639
Technical notes
The support consists of two vertically grained oak planks. Dendrochronology has shown that the youngest heartwood ring was formed in 1614. The panel could have been ready for use by 1629, but a date in or after 1631 is more likely. The panel is not bevelled on the right, and might have been larger here. There is a 9.9 cm crack in the upper right corner that was probably already there and even mended before the support was primed, as pigments from the light-coloured ground are present on it. The greyish imprimatura is visible below the large tulip at upper left. A reddish-brown layer, which shows through the greenish-brown paint of the background, has been applied over the imprimatura. The background was painted in after the flowers were completed. The paint was applied in thin, smooth layers.
Scientific examination and reports
- dendrochronology: P. Klein, RMA, 14 April 1998
- technical report: M. van de Laar, RMA, 23 January 2003
Condition
Good. The paint has become somewhat transparent in several areas, such as the background flowers. The use of smalt for some of the flowers has led to discolouration.
Conservation
- M. van de Laar, 1998: complete restoration; several cracks in both planks of the panel glued
Provenance
...; sale, F.M. Hodgson (†), dowager of P.C. Baron Nahuys et al., Amsterdam (F. Muller et al.), 14 November 1883 (hors de catalogue), fl. 235, to the museum1
Object number: SK-A-799
Copyright: Public domain
The artist
Hans Bollongier (? Haarlem c. 1600 - Haarlem 1672/75)
Bollongier, who also spelled his name Bollangier and Boulenger, was probably born in Haarlem around 1600. His father came from Roeselare in Flanders and married in Haarlem in 1597. Nothing is known about Bollongier’s artistic training. He entered the Haarlem guild in 1623 and was recorded in its archives in 1634 and 1642. His oeuvre consists of still lifes with flowers, occasionally combined with fruit. There are also a number of genre scenes in the manner of Adriaen Brouwer that are inscribed Hbollongier, one of which is dated 1628.2 However, these may be attributed to Hans’s brother Horatio, who was probably also a painter. Samuel Ampzing mentions Hans Bollongier as a painter of flowers in 1628. Bollongier was the only Haarlem artist who specialized in this genre in the second quarter of the 17th century. He may have been influenced by Johannes Bosschaert, one of Ambrosius Bosschaert’s sons, who lived in Haarlem around 1623-25, and who joined the Haarlem guild in the same year as he did. Bollongier’s early work, however, often comes very close to the manner of Ambrosius Bosschaert the Younger. Most of his dated still lifes are from between 1627 and 1645, but two works are dated 1672, indicating that he did not give up painting after the mid-1640s. The precise date of his death is not known, but it must have been between 1672, the date of his last paintings, and 1675, the year in which his brother Horatio is mentioned as his heir.
Gerdien Wuestman, 2007
References
Ampzing 1628, p. 372; Schrevelius 1648, p. 390; Miedema 1980, I, pp. 420, 532, 535; Bol 1982, pp. 90-92; Gemar-Koeltzsch 1994, I, pp. 53-55; Meijer in Saur XII, 1996, p. 401; Van der Willigen/Meijer 2003, pp. 41-42; Van Thiel-Stroman 2006, pp. 114-15
Entry
In contrast to earlier flower painters such as Ambrosius Bosschaert and Roelant Savery, Hans Bollongier did not set out to make individual portraits of flowers, but tried to create convincing bouquets by overlapping and shading. The artist depicted plain glass vases and fan-shaped bouquets, dominated by either tulips or carnations. Broken white, pink and pinkish-red or mauve are the most prominent colours. The neutral background composed of brownish tints is another characteristic feature in his flower pieces.3 Several authors have observed that the tonality of Bollongier’s work recalls the work of the Haarlem still-life painters Pieter Claesz and Willem Heda.4
With its exuberant bouquet of tulips, the present painting is one of Bollongier’s most ambitious works. The tonal palette is a typical feature of his mature phase, contrasting with such early works as the 1627 Still Life with Flowers.5 Another typical feature is the dramatic lighting: the flowers cast strong shadows, and the upper ones are almost entirely shaded. The glass container in the present painting is found in Bollongier’s flower pieces from 1627 to 1639.6 Although the bouquet looks quite natural, it certainly never existed in reality. Not only do the depicted flowers blossom in different seasons, it is inconceivable that such a small vase holding such a large bouquet would not fall over.
Tulips were very popular in the 17th century and they often feature in contemporary flower still lifes. However, bouquets that consist solely or mainly of tulips, such as Bollongier’s, are relatively rare.7 The artist included one of the most expensive varieties of striped tulip with scalloped petals in this composition, which has led to the question whether the painting can be interpreted as a comment on the tulip craze of the 1630s in general and, more specifically, on the collapse of the bulb trade in 1637.8 Although flowers were at times seen as symbols of transience, and details such as the cracks in the stone ledge might be interpreted as tokens of decay, the iconography of the present painting is not specific enough to conclude that Bollongier intended to allude to the catastrophe that occurred two years prior to its execution.
Gerdien Wuestman, 2007
See Bibliography and Rijksmuseum painting catalogues
See Key to abbreviations and Acknowledgements
This entry was published in J. Bikker (ed.), Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth Century in the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, I: Artists Born between 1570 and 1600, coll. cat. Amsterdam 2007, no. 23.
Literature
Gemar-Koeltzsch 1995, I, p. 140, no. 42/8, with selected earlier literature; Chong and Kloek in Amsterdam-Cleveland 1999, pp. 158-60, no. 24
Collection catalogues
1887, p. 21, no. 165; 1903, p. 55, no. 554; 1934, p. 53, no. 554; 1960, p. 46, no. 554; 1976, pp. 126-27, no. A 799; 2007, no. 23
Citation
G. Wuestman, 2007, 'Hans Bollongier, Still Life with Flowers, 1639', in J. Bikker (ed.), Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth Century in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: hdl.handle.net/10934/RM0001.COLLECT.6117
(accessed 9 November 2024 02:51:05).