 |
Godfried Schalcken (Made 1643 – 1706 The Hague) A young lady playing with a dog oil on panel Provenance: Literature:
Godfried Schalcken was born in the small town of Made, near Breda, in 1643. When he was eleven years old, the family moved to Dordrecht where the youthful apprentice entered the studio of Samuel van Hoogstraten. Around 1662, Schalcken went to Leiden to complete his artistic training under Gerrit Dou. The meticulously rendered detail and use of artificial lighting in Schalcken’s earliest works, such as the Doctor’s Visit (German Private Collection), reflect the influence of Dou and the Leiden fijnschilders. However, by the 1670s, the artist had established his own unique style and his thematic range had far surpassed his teacher. Although he was best known for portrait painting, Schalcken also produced genre scenes, history paintings, and the occasional still life. He was acclaimed throughout his career for his subtle rendering of natural and artificial light. His interest in nocturnes was undoubtedly inspired by Dou. The eighteenth century English engraver George Vertue (1684-1756) remarked that Schalcken’s “rendering [of] a single effect of light was all his excellence.” The present painting is a strikingly beautiful example of the artist’s genre work. In this charming picture, a young lady playfully teaches her brown and white-furred spaniel a trick. The scene is staged behind a window sill, and before a distant landscape. The careful detail of the woman’s beautifully rendered garments reflects the influence of the Leiden fijnschilders. Schalcken enhanced the scene by juxtaposing the bright, direct light on the lady in the foreground against the setting sun and twilight in the distance. A similar version of this work exists, slightly larger (8 ¼ by 6 ½ inches, 21 by 16.5 cm.), and with an arched top. In 1833, John Smith (followed by Hofstede de Groot in 1912) recorded two different representations of a young lady playing with a dog by Godfried Schalcken.1 One version describes “a pretty young woman, wearing a yellow dress, represented in nearly profile view, amusing herself by making a spaniel sit upon a table” from the collection of the Earl of Coventry, measuring 8 by 6 ½ inches. The second, “A pretty young woman, seated at a table, playing with a pet dog,” was sold in the collection of the Marquis of Camden in 1841, measuring “About 8 ½ by 7 inches.” It is difficult to establish which version each entry is referring to. It can be noted with certainty that the arched top painting was in the collection of the Duke of Lansdowne in 1897,2 due to the fact that a later auction catalogue of the Lansdowne Collection sale describes the painting as “oil on panel-arched top” (Christie’s, London, May 16, 1952, lot 86). Earlier provenance exists, describing a painting of this subject by Schalcken, but it is impossible to determine whether this early history pertains to our painting or the other version. The other version with the arched top, last sold at Phillips, London on July 7, 1992, lot 85, was attributed fully to Schalcken in the Phillips sale catalogue; however, a saleroom notice made it clear that it was a copy and ours (sold at Sotheby's in 1989–see provenance) is the original. In his 1988 monograph of the artist, Thierry Beherman also identifies two versions; however, the author lists the painting with the arched top as the original and includes an unrelated additional variant as a copy.3 1 John Smith, A Catalogue raisonné of the works of the most eminent Dutch, Flemish and French Painters¸ London, 1833, p. 588, no. 1 and p. 592, no. 19. 2Catalogue of Pictures belonging to the Marquess of Landsdowne, London, 1897, p. 100, no. 143. 3 Thierry Beherman, Godfried Schalcken, Maeght, 1988, p. 245, no. 152 and no. 152a. |