Master Paintings Part II

Studio of Gerard ter Borch

A barn interior with a maid milking cows

Lot Closed

January 28, 03:22 PM GMT

Estimate

20,000 - 30,000 USD

Lot Details

Description

Studio of Gerard ter Borch

Zwolle 1617 - 1681 Deventer

A barn interior with a maid milking cows

signed with monogram lower left on axe blade: GTB

oil on canvas

canvas: 22½ by 23½ in.; 57.2 by 59.7 cm.

framed: 29¾ by 30⅞ in.; 75.6 by 78.4 cm.

Cornelis Groeninx van Zoelen (1740-1797), Rotterdam;

Thence by descent to Otto-Paulus Groeninx van Zoelen (1768-1848);

His sale, Rotterdam, Vis, 25 July 1800, lot 82, fl. 72 to Van Santen;

Herbert William Francis Hunter-Arundell, Auldgirth, Dumfries-shire;

His sale, London, Christie’s, 21 November 1913, lot 127, £966 to F.W. Lippmann (as G. Terburg);

There acquired by F.W. Lippmann;

By whom sold, London, Christie's, 20 April 1923, lot 152, £229 to T. Ward (as Gerard ter Borch, accompanied by a letter from Wilhelm von Bode);

Maximilian Kellner (1869-1940), Moravia and Vienna;

His sale, Berlin, Rudolph Lepke, 3 December 1929, lot 16, RM 20,800 (as Gerard Terborch);

Professor Julius Singer, Prague, by 1938;

Thence by descent in the family;

By whom anonymously sold ("The Property of a Gentleman"), London, Christie's, 25 April 2008, lot 15 (as Follower of Gerard Ter Borch II).

C. Hofstede de Groot, A Catalogue Raisonné of the Works of the Most Eminent Dutch Painters of the Seventeenth Century, vol. V, London and Paris 1913, pp. 140-141, under cat. no. 463;
S.J. Gudlaugsson, Katalog der Gemälde Gerard ter Borch, The Hague 1960, vol. II, p. 94, cat. 74a (a skillful work, possibly a copy by Caspar Netscher).

This is the only studio replica of ter Borch’s painting of c.1653/1654 in the Getty Museum, which has been described as “the most remarkable expression of ter Borch’s familiarity with rural life.”¹Many elements in the present picture are close in quality to the Getty painting: the cow on the right is painted with tremendous sensitivity and attention to detail, from her pale eyelashes and moist nose to the flashes of light glinting off her hooves. The farm implements at lower left and the milkmaid are similarly accomplished.

Gudlaugsson’s catalogue raisonné lists nearly 500 copies of Ter Borch’s paintings, of which the vast majority are weak, later pictures. Only 29 of the copies bear the artist’s monogram, and even among this small group, Gudlaugsson dismissed the majority as too unaccomplished to be the product of the studio. Indeed, he only accepted 11 monogrammed copies as being clearly from the Ter Borch workshop, five of which – the present painting among them – he suggested could be by a young Caspar Netscher.² Netscher, ter Borch’s prized pupil, spent nearly five years in the studio, from 1654 to circa 1659, where his duties would have included executing faithful copies of his master’s works. The finest replicas would have been signed with the GTB monogram and sold as ter Borchs.

1. A. Wheelock et al, Gerard ter Borch, exhibition catalogue, Washington D.C. and Detroit 2004, p. 108.
https://www.getty.edu/art/collection/objects/711/gerard-ter-borch-a-maid-milking-a-cow-in-a-barn-dutch-about-1652-1654/

2. Recent restoration has shown the monogram to be original to the present painting. The five monogrammed pictures Gudlaugsson believed could be by Netscher are 74a (the present picture), 113r, 121a, 140b, and 141b. The other six monogrammed pictures he believed came from the workshop are 67a, 120a, 220d, 221 Ia, 253a, and 275a.