QUIRINGH GERRITSZ. VAN BREKELENKAM | A hermit praying

Probably Graf Eltz, Mainz;

Probably his sale, Mainz, 17 May 1785, lot 330;

Anonymous sale, Copenhagen, Rasmussen, 5-19 March 1969, lot 304, where acquired.

A. Lasius, Quiringh van Brekelenkam, Doornspijk 1992, p. 83, cat. no. 9;

H.-J. Raupp (ed.), Niederländische Malerei des. 17. Jahrhunderts der SØR Rusche-Sammlung, vol. 2, Genre, Münster/Hamburg/London 1996, pp. 64-67, cat. no. 13, reproduced in colour.

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The majority of Brekelenkam's depictions of hermits date from the first half of the 1650s. He often repeated compositions, in which the hermit usually kneels praying under a kind of stone vault, with only minor variations in the objects upon the table, or in the monk's attitude, though the physiognomy of the figure generally remains the same: gaunt, bearded and with a long, thin nose. The present painting bears most similarity to the work in the Mittelrheinisches Landesmuseum, Mainz (inv. no. 679).¹

1 See Lasius 1992, p. 83, cat. no. 8, reproduced plate 1.