Object data
oil on panel
support: height 43.9 cm × width 37.6 cm
Philips Wouwerman
The Grey
c. 1646
Inscriptions
- signature, with monogram, bottom left, below the dog (P and H ligated): PH .W
Technical notes
Support The single, vertically grained, quarter-sawn oak plank is approx. 1.4 cm thick on the left and 0.6 cm on the right. The top edge is uneven and seems to have been trimmed slightly. Plane marks are visible in raking light on the front. The reverse is bevelled on all sides and has regularly spaced saw marks. Dendrochronology has shown that the youngest heartwood ring was formed in 1631. The panel could have been ready for use by 1642, but a date in or after 1648 is more likely.
Preparatory layers The single, thin, off-white ground extends over the edges of the support at the bottom and on the left and right, but not over the top edge, and barely fills the grain of the wood.
Underdrawing No underdrawing could be detected with the naked eye or infrared photography.
Paint layers The paint extends up to the edges of the support. The sky and landscape were applied with reserves for the main figures and the tree. Small details such as branches and leaves were subsequently added over the background. A cross-section shows that the sky at upper left was placed directly on top of the ground in two layers: the first being a coarse blue consisting of mostly white pigment with small greyish-blue and bigger blue pigment particles, followed by a thin, finely ground white layer containing small orange and dark, brownish pigment particles. The foreground at lower right was applied on top of the ground in one layer of brownish paint composed of black, red, blue and larger white pigment particles. The paint was thinly applied with dabbed brushstrokes. Small adjustments were made to the contours of the boy’s arm and mouth, and the horse’s mouth.
Anna Krekeler, Ige Verslype, 2022
Scientific examination and reports
- infrared photography: A. Krekeler, RMA, 18 March 2008
- technical report: A. Krekeler, RMA, 18 March 2008
- paint samples: I. Verslype, RMA, nos. SK-A-1610/1-2, 4 April 2008
- dendrochronology: P. Klein, RMA, 16 December 2008
Condition
Good. A damaged area in the lower left corner has been repaired and shows somewhat discoloured retouching. The varnish is slightly matte and has an uneven gloss.
Provenance
...; ? sale, Anna Catharina Putman (1727-1801), Amsterdam (P. van der Schley et al.), 17 August 1803, no. 90 (‘Op een grazigen Heuvel, by de Stam van een doden Boom, ziet men een Jongeling, welke een fraai wit gezadeld Paard by het bit houd, terwyl de Ruiter agter den heuvel zich vertoond; op den met kruiden bewassen Voorgrond legt een Hond [...], hoog 17, breed 15 duim [43.7 x 38.6 cm], op Panneel’), fl. 650, to Roos;1...; ? sale, Dirk Versteegh (1751-1822, Amsterdam), Amsterdam (J. de Vries et al.), 3 November 1823, no. 47 (‘Sur une Colline on voit un cheval blanc, tenu à la bride par un garçon, auprès duquel un chien couché, plus loin un homme près d’un tronc d’arbre [...] de Ph. Wouwerman. B. h. 4 p. 4 p., l. 3 p. 8 p. [44 x 38 cm]’), fl. 928, to M. van den Bergh;2...; ? sale, Roothaan, Amsterdam (J. de Vries et al.), 29 March 1826, no. 133 (‘hoog 4 p. 4 d., breed 3 p. 7 d. [44 x 37 cm] Paneel. Op eenen Heuvel bij een dorre boomstam staat een Jongeling, houdende een gezadeld paard bij den toom; een zwarte hond ligt bij dezelve op den grond; verder een man bij een boomstam [...]’), fl. 950, to Van den Berg;3...; collection W.P. van Lennep, Amsterdam, 1867;4 by descent to Margaretha Catharina Messchert van Vollenhoven, née Van Lennep (1815-1891); her sale, Amsterdam (C.F. Roos), 29 March 1892, no. 15, fl. 15,000, to the Vereniging Rembrandt; from which, fl. 8,000, to the museum, March 1894
Object number: SK-A-1610
Credit line: Purchased with the support of the Vereniging Rembrandt
Copyright: Public domain
The artist
Philips Wouwerman (Haarlem 1619 - Haarlem 1668)
Philips Wouwerman was baptized in Haarlem on 24 May 1619 as a son of the history painter Pouwels Joostensz, who was probably his teacher. De Bie says that he was a pupil of Frans Hals, although their work has nothing in common. An apprenticeship with Pieter Cornelisz Verbeeck is suspected on stylistic grounds. Another important influence was Pieter van Laer, who was also Haarlem-born and bred. It is known from notes made by the artist Matthias Scheits that Wouwerman, who came from a Reformed family, fled to Hamburg in 1638 in order to marry the Catholic Anna Pietersdr van Broeckhoff. He stayed there for a while, working in the studio of the history painter Evert Decker, but two years later he is again documented in his native Haarlem, where he remained for the rest of his life.
Wouwerman’s earliest dated painting is Military Encampment with Soldiers Gambling of 1639.5 He joined the Haarlem Guild of St Luke in 1640, being elected to the office of warden in 1646, and from 1642 and 1651 he served in the St George Civic Guard. Wouwerman made several history pieces with religious subjects for Catholic patrons. It is clear from various sources that he was a prosperous man. Houbraken mentions that he had important patrons from the very beginning of his career, and was able to give his daughter a dowry of 20,000 guilders. He supplemented his income by speculating on the property market and dealing in art. However, there are also indications that he suffered periods of poverty. For example, he is said to have painted his Miracle of St Hubert in 1660 for the clandestine Sint-Bernarduskerk in Haarlem in thanks for the financial support he had received from the parish priest. He remained productive to the end of his life, with his last dated picture, Grey Standing in a Stable,6 being executed in the year of his death. He died on 19 May 1668 and was buried in the Nieuwe Kerk in Haarlem four days later. Paintings by or belonging to him were sold at auction on 7 May 1670, a few months after the decease of his wife.
Wouwerman gained fame as a painter of horses, and specialized in landscapes with riders, ranging from battle scenes and army camps to hunting parties, horse fairs and stables. He also supplied the figures in landscapes by other Haarlem artists like Jacob van Ruisdael, Jan Wijnants and Cornelis Decker. His many pupils included Nicolaes Ficke (c. 1620/23-before 1702), Emanuel Murant (1622-c. 1700), Simon Dubois (1632-1708) and Anthonie de Haen (1640/41-in or before 1675). He may also have taught his younger brothers Pieter (1623-1682) and Jan (1629-1666). Wouwerman’s work, which in the eighteenth century fetched some of the highest prices for paintings from the Dutch Golden Age, was imitated by countless others.
Gerdien Wuestman, 2022
References
T. Schrevelius, Harlemias, Haarlem 1648, p. 384; C. de Bie, Het gulden cabinet van de edel vrij schilder const, inhoudende den lof vande vermarste schilders, architecte, beldthowers ende plaetsnijders van deze eeuw, Antwerp 1662, pp. 281-82; A. Houbraken, De groote schouburgh der Nederlantsche konstschilders en schilderessen, II, Amsterdam 1719, pp. 70-75, 102; R. van Eynden and A. van der Willigen, Geschiedenis der vaderlandsche schilderkunst, sedert de helft der XVIII eeuw, I, Haarlem 1816, pp. 404-06; A. van der Willigen, Geschiedkundige aanteekeningen over Haarlemsche schilders en andere beoefenaren van de beeldende kunsten, voorafgegaan door eene korte geschiedenis van het schilders- of St. Lucas Gild aldaar, Haarlem 1866, pp. 241-44; C.J. Gonnet, ‘De schilders Pouwels, Pieter en Steven Wouwerman’, in F.D.O. Obreen, Archief voor Nederlandsche kunstgeschiedenis: Verzameling van meerendeels onuitgegeven berichten en mededeelingen betreffende Nederlandsche schilders, plaatsnijders, beeldhouwers, bouwmeesters, juweliers, goud- en zilverdrijvers [enz.], VII, Rotterdam 1888-90, pp. 118-26; C. Hofstede de Groot, ‘Die Malerfamilie Wouwerman’, Kunstchronik, N.S. 2 (1890-91), cols. 1-5; A. Lichtwark, Matthias Scheits, als Schilderer des Hamburger Lebens, 1650-1700, Hamburg 1899, pp. 43-44; S. Kalff, ‘De gebroeders Wouwerman’, Elsevier’s Geïllustreerd Maandschrift 30 (1920), pp. 96-103; U. Thieme and F. Becker (eds.), Allgemeines Lexikon der bildenden Künstler von der Antike bis zur Gegenwart, XXXVI, Leipzig 1947, pp. 265-68; H. Miedema, De archiefbescheiden van het St. Lucasgilde te Haarlem, 1497-1798, II, Alphen aan den Rijn 1980, p. 1211; F.J. Duparc, ‘Philips Wouwerman, 1619-1668’, Oud Holland 107 (1993), pp. 257-86; B. Schumacher, Philips Wouwerman (1619-1668): The Horse Painter of the Golden Age, I, Doornspijk 2006, pp. 13-21, 25-38; 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. 99-363, esp. pp. 357-61
Entry
The Grey was the penultimate painting by Philips Wouwerman to enter the museum when it was acquired in 1894, and it soon became the favourite of the artist’s twentieth-century admirers.7 It is in a palette of predominantly brown and grey tints, the only touch of bright colour being the red saddle. Technically the animal is known as a palfrey, a small type of horse of no particular breed for ordinary riding.8 Its monumental appearance is due to the low vantage point and the way in which it stands out against the sky, in stark contrast to the small figure on the right, who has been identified as the rider answering a call of nature.
Like the bulk of Wouwerman’s works this panel is undated, but thanks to a 1646 painting of a related scene in Leipzig it is not difficult to place The Grey in the chronology of the oeuvre.9 The signature ‘PH . W’ also indicates an early origin, in or before 1646, because that was the year when Wouwerman expanded his monogram to ‘PHiLS W’.10
Drawn works by Wouwerman are relatively scarce, certainly in comparison to the scale of his painted oeuvre, and in this case, too, there is no known preliminary study.11 One drawing that surfaced recently is probably a copy.12 Wouwerman repeated the subject of the grey horse with the red saddle and the solitary figure beside it in several variants.13
The Rijksmuseum panel has rightly been associated with Pieter van Laer, whose work had a profound influence on Wouwerman’s in the 1640s.14 The composition is particularly reminiscent of his six-piece suite of etchings of horses,15 although Wouwerman’s palfrey looks far more naturalistic. Schumacher has also drawn attention to similarities to an undated picture by another artist who put his stamp on Wouwerman’s early output, the horse painter Pieter Cornelisz Verbeeck.16
There are two works in Hofstede de Groot’s oeuvre catalogue of 1908 which can be associated with The Grey in the Rijksmuseum.17 One of them, which according to the author is identical to it, was in the Dirk Versteegh sale of 1823,18 while the other was supposedly sold at the Putman and Roothaan auctions of 1803 and 1826 respectively.19 It was probably the same painting in all these cases.20
Gerdien Wuestman, 2022
See Key to abbreviations, Rijksmuseum painting catalogues and Acknowledgements
Literature
C. Hofstede de Groot, Beschreibendes und kritisches Verzeichnis der Werke der hervorragendsten holländischen Maler des XVII. Jahrhunderts, II, Esslingen/Paris 1908, p. 317, no. 207, p. 326, no. 250; B. Schumacher, Philips Wouwerman (1619-1668): The Horse Painter of the Golden Age, I, Doornspijk 2006, pp. 62, 80, 302-03, no. A328
Collection catalogues
1903, p. 304, no. 2720; 1934, p. 325, no. 2720; 1960, p. 348, no. 2720; 1976, p. 615, no. A 1610
Citation
Gerdien Wuestman, 2022, 'Philips Wouwerman, The Grey, c. 1646', in J. Bikker (ed.), Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth Century in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: hdl.handle.net/10934/RM0001.COLLECT.6592
(accessed 22 November 2024 15:54:51).