Object data
black chalk, with point of brush and grey ink and grey wash; framing line in brown ink
height 181 mm × width 162 mm
Roelant Roghman
c. 1650 - c. 1657
black chalk, with point of brush and grey ink and grey wash; framing line in brown ink
height 181 mm × width 162 mm
Creases, discolouration and many abrasions, restored, from multiple folding; lower right, dark brown spot
…; anonymous sale, Leipzig;1 collection Carel Vosmaer (1826-88), The Hague; his son, Prof. Dr Gualtherus Carel Jacob Vosmaer (1854-1916), Leiden;2 his son, Carel Johannes Jacob Gualtherus Vosmaer (1907-86), Leiden;3 from whose heirs, with 212 other drawings, fl. 650,000, to the museum (L. 2228), with the support of the Vereniging Rembrandt, the Rijksmuseum Stichting and De Ster Holding BV, 1989
Object number: RP-T-1989-92
Credit line: Purchased with the support of the Vereniging Rembrandt, with additional funding from the Prins Bernhard Fonds, the Rijksmuseum-Stichting and De Ster Holding BV
Copyright: Public domain
Roelant Roghman (Amsterdam 1627 - Amsterdam 1692)
He was the son of Hendrick Lambertsz Roghman (1602-1647/57) and Maria Saverij and was baptized on 25 March 1627 in Amsterdam’s Nieuwe Kerk. His father worked as an engraver,4 as did two of his five siblings: his sisters Geertruyt (1625-c. 1651/57) and Magdalena (16325-after 1669).6 Through his mother, Roelant was a grandson of Jacob Savery I (1566-1603) and a great-nephew of Roelant Savery (1576-1639), after whom he was named. It is not known under whom he trained, but it is likely that he was influenced by the example of his grandfather and great-uncle. Although sometimes grouped with the pupils of Rembrandt (1606-1669), Roghman never actually studied with him. They were friends, however, and according to Houbraken, Rembrandt refused to accept Jan Griffier (1645/52-1718) as an apprentice because he was already studying with his friend Roghman.
Roghman was a prolific draughtsman, whose earliest dated works are two drawn views of tollhouses on the River IJ, both dated 1645, in the Van Eeghen collection, Stadsarchief, Amsterdam (inv. nos. 10055/28) and 10055/29).7 Among the works possibly made even earlier is a pen-and-wash drawing in the Kupferstich-Kabinett, Dresden (inv. nos. C 1798), clearly influenced by Roelant Savery.8
In 1646/47, Roghman embarked on his most ambitious project, the series of some 250 castle drawings, of which the Rijksmuseum owns 49 individual sheets. Besides travelling through the Dutch provinces to make castle drawings and topographical views, he also visited Brussels and the region around Cleves.9 A number of alpine landscapes – including one in the Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam (inv. no. MB 221), dated 165410 – suggest that he must have travelled to the Alps that year,11 presumably passing through France. A trip further south may be documented by a View of San Giacomo a Rialto in the Kupferstichkabinett, Berlin (KdZ 2617), traditionally attributed to the artist,12 and a signed drawing in the Klassik Stiftung Weimar, Sailing Boat at a Moorage, could have well been made in Venice.13 In 1657, Roghman stayed in Augsburg, where he had a set of six etched alpine landscapes published by Melchior Küsel (1626-1684)14 and contributed a drawing to an album amicorum (inv. no. RP-T-1898-A-3991). No later than 1658, he was back in Amsterdam, where he is documented during the 1660s. In 1672, his opinion was sought on the authenticity of a group of Italian paintings in a legal dispute between Gerrit Uylenburgh (c. 1625-1679) and Friedrich Wilhelm, Elector of Brandenburg (1620-1688).
Roghman’s rare paintings feature mostly mountain scenes and were probably done after his trip to the Alps. Of his circa fifty etchings, mostly landscapes, one depicts the Breach of the St Anthony’s Dike,15 a famous incident in 1651 that was also recorded by Jan Asselijn (c. 1610-1652), for example in his painting in the Rijksmuseum (inv. no. SK-A-5030), Willem Schellinks (1627-1678) and Jacob Esselens (1626-1687).
Roghman apparently never married and from 1686 lived in Amsterdam’s Oudemannenhuis (Old Men’s Home). His last dated drawing is from 1657, but according to Houbraken, he continued to produce art well into his old age. He died on 3 January 1692 and was buried in the St Anthonis Kerkhof, Amsterdam.
Annemarie Stefes, 2018
References
A. Houbraken, De groote schouburgh der Nederlantsche konstschilders en schilderessen, 3 vols., Amsterdam 1718-21, I (1718), pp. 173-74; III (1721), p. 358; A. von Wurzbach, Niederländisches Künstlerlexikon, 3 vols., Vienna/Leipzig 1906-11, II (1910), p. 464; R. Juynboll, ‘Roelant Roghman’, in U. Thieme and F. Becker, Allgemeines Lexikon der bildenden Künstler: Von der Antike bis zur Gegenwart, 37 vols., Leipzig 1907-50, XXVIII (1934), p. 518, with earlier literature; W.T. Kloek, ‘Een berglandschap door Roelant Roghman’, Bulletin van het Rijksmuseum 23 (1975), no. 2, pp. 100-01; F.W.H. Hollstein et al., Dutch and Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts, c. 1450-1700, 72 vols, Amsterdam and elsewhere 1947-2010, XX (1978), pp. 67-93; H. Gerson and B.W. Meijer (eds.), Ausbreitung und Nachwirkung der Holländischen Malerei des 17. Jahrhunderts, Amsterdam 1983 (rev. ed.; orig. ed. 1942), pp. 27, 49, 130, 186, 293, 307, 356, 403; W. Kloek and J.W. Niemeijer, De kasteeltekeningen van Roelant Roghman II, Alphen aan den Rijn 1990, pp. 1-14; W. Sumowski, Drawings of the Rembrandt School, 10 vols., New York 1979-92, X (1992), pp. 4989-5174; P. Groenendijk, Beknopt biografisch lexicon van Zuid- en Noord-Nederlandse schilders, graveurs, glasschilders, tapijtwevers et cetera van ca. 1350 tot ca. 1720, Utrecht 2008, p. 642
With its broad, sketchy style, the present drawing resembles Roghman’s chalk sketches from circa 1650 (cf. inv. nos. RP-T-1899-A-4241, RP-T-1899-A-4242 and RP-T-1887-A-1385), as well as an album page with a Landscape with Two Shepherds Resting near a Sarcophagus, signed and dated by the artist, 1657 den 30 Augustij Roelandt Roghm[an]_, which is preserved in the Städtisches Kunstsammlungen, Augsburg (inv. no. G 7777).16
Although described as an imaginary view by Schatborn in the Vosmaer exhibition catalogue of 1989, it is not to be excluded that this coastal landscape records an actual site. If so, it might be well associated with the artist’s presumed journey through the Alps to the south (c. 1654-1657).
Annemarie Stefes, 2018
J.F. Heijbroek (ed.), De verzameling van mr. Carel Vosmaer (1826-1888), exh. cat. Amsterdam (Rijksprentenkabinet) 1989, no. 11; H.-U. Beck, ‘Netherlandish Drawings in the Städtische Kunstsammlungen, Augsburg’, Master Drawings 39 (2001), no. 4, p. 401
A. Stefes, 2018, 'Roelant Roghman, Wooded Coastal Landscape, c. 1650 - c. 1657', in J. Turner (ed.), Dutch Drawings of the Seventeenth Century in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: hdl.handle.net/10934/RM0001.COLLECT.59936
(accessed 12 November 2024 00:31:57).