David Teniers the Younger

Private collection, Paris, circa 1750;

Anonymous sale, Vienna, Dorotheum, 25 June 1924, lot 61;

Anonymous sale, Vienna, Dorotheum, 28 January 1925, lot 38;

With P. de. Boer, Amsterdam, 1929;

Galerie Finck, Brussels, 1980;

Private collection, Paris;

Anonymous sale, Paris, Artcurial, 22 September 2021, lot 366 (as 18th century follower of David Teniers II);

Where acquired.

ENGRAVED

Etching, by Jean-Baptiste Rigaud, circa 1750.

Rendered with vigorous, coarse brushwork and set within a rustic tavern interior, the present painting is an excellent example of David Teniers the Younger’s area of specialization–contemporary scenes of peasant life. Accessorized with clay pipes and beer mugs, four men are gathered around a tric-trac or backgammon board atop a wooden table. In the background, a trio drinks and converses by a fireplace at left, and a barmaid holding refreshments enters through the door at right. Teniers often drew inspiration from the works of fellow Flemish painter Adriaen Brouwer (c. 1605/6-1638), and in this case perhaps looked to his Peasants Playing Tric Trac in the Museum der Bildenden Künste, Leipzig (inv. no. G1556). 

An engraving executed in Paris during the 1750s indicates that the present painting once belonged in an eighteenth-century French collection.¹

¹ See Rigaud, Divertissement Flamand, engraving. Braunschweig, Herzog Anton Ulrich-Museum, inv. no. JBRigaud AB 3.1.