Jacques des Rousseaux

Anonymous sale, The Hague, Van Marle & Bignell, 16 December 1958, lot 122 (as Rembrandt).

The actual painting is warmer and less red in tone than the catalogue illustration suggests. The single panel is flat and stable and beveled on all sides. The paint surface is well preserved, particularly in the highlights. The wood grain is visible to the front, as can be seen on the catalogue illustration. The paint surface is under a thick and glossy layer of varnish and its removal would improve the tonality. No damages are visible to the naked eye. Under UV light small retouchings can be made out to the right half of the figure's face, and minor ones in the hair on the left. Offered in an elaborate gilt plaster and wood frame with damages to the lower right and upper left corners. (MW)
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NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."

With its characteristic modelling of the old man's features and the amazingly loose brushwork in the beard, this painting clearly demonstrates how strongly Des Rousseaux's tronies were influenced by the early work of Jan Lievens (1607-1674). Like Des Rousseaux's Old Man Praying, in a private collection, Switzerland¹, the present work is in its execution remarkably comparable to Lievens' Bearded Old Man, in the Herzog Anton-Ulrich Museum, Brunswick.² 
Des Rousseaux's single figures and tronies were studies for the artist's religious works and many of the, often elderly, sitters in his paintings were used as a model on several occasions. A near identical version of the present work was sold, London, Christie's, 25 April 2001, lot 68.³

1. See W. Sumowski, Gemälde der Rembrandt-Schüler, Landau/Pfalz 1983, vol. IV, p. 2506, cat. no. 1676, reproduced p. 2512.
2. Ibid., vol. III, p. 1801, cat. no. 1263, reproduced p. 1902.
3. Ibid., vol. VI, p. 3741, cat. no. 2428, reproduced p. 4046.