DUTCH SCHOOL, CIRCA 1660 | Half-length portrait of a man, possibly Hendrick Schoock (1630-1707)

Collection non identifiée (L.1533^a, sur une pastille collée au verso de l'ancien cadre) ; 
Collection Charles Ferdinand Louis, marquis de Valori-Rustichelli (1820-1883), Paris (L.2500, en bas à droite) ; 
Sa vente, Paris, Hôtel des commissaires-priseurs, 25-26 novembre 1907, n°57, repr. (comme Anthony van Dyck) ; 
Collection particulière, Paris ; 
Acquis en 1999.

Rennes, 2012, n°30 (notice par Stijn Alsteens)

Hinged to the mount with Japan paper tabs, top edge. Further Japan paper tabs fixed to the other three sides, to facilitate handling. Small thin spot in the paper, lower left corner. Light brown stain below sitter's left hand. Otherwise in good, fresh condition. Sold unframed.
"In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
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."

Although drawn portraits made as studies for engravings or as finished works of art for sale are not especially rare in 17^th-century Dutch art, and certain artists, including Jan Lievens (1607-1674) and Johannes Thopas (1627-1695), even made something of a speciality of works of this type, the present drawing is rather unusual, in being very freely executed, yet at the same time produced as a finished work, within a fictive oval frame, with a detailed inscription on the reverse.  This inscription is both fascinating and tantalising.  It includes a partially cut date which must be read as 1660, and also a note that someone, whose name is no longer there, was a ‘pupil of the famous and illustrious painter Joannes de Heem’, in other words the famous still-life painter Jan Davidsz. de Heem (1606-1683).  But was the person referred to in the inscription the subject or the author of the drawing?   De Heem was a native of Utrecht, who also worked in Leiden, but who spent most of his career in Antwerp, where he lived from 1636 until 1664, and again from 1674 until his death.

Stylistically, this energetic and extremely accomplished drawing would appear to have been made by an artist who was aware of the portrait tradition of Van Dyck, as expressed through the extraordinary series of portraits of artists and other illustrious figures, engraved from his drawings and published as the Iconography, but who was also very familiar with mid-century portraiture in the Northern Netherlands, and the drawings of Jan Lievens.  No specific attribution has, however, so far been convincingly advanced.  If the sitter, rather than the artist, was the pupil of De Heem referred to in the inscription, the obvious candidate would be the artist’s son Cornelis, but in 1660 Cornelis de Heem would have been 29 years old, and the man seen here looks rather older. 

For now, the authorship and function of this intriguing drawing must remain unresolved, but it is in any case a drawing of the highest quality, which captures in skilful, rapid strokes of black and white chalk the character of this serious yet amiable Dutchman.