George Hendrik Breitner Dutch, 1857-1923

Sotheby’s is delighted to present an outstanding group of works by George Hendrik Breitner (1857-1923) from the collection assembled by Dr J. ten Bokkel.

Spanning Breitner’s early Hague years to the Amsterdam mature period and with all the iconic themes prominently featured, the Ten Bokkel Collection gives an impressive overview of the artist’s oeuvre.

Dr ten Bokkel’s fascination for George Hendrik Breitner began at an early age. In his parental home, a painting depicting a horse cart on a bridge already impressed him as a young boy. This work was acquired directly from Breitner by his grandfather. It was then that a life long passion started for the artist who was so far ahead of his time with his crude, expressive style.

In the 1980’s, Dr ten Bokkel began collecting Breitner’s art. His first acquisition was a masterpiece: ‘Girls in the snow’. This powerful painting shows three working class girls, painted with raw strength and roughly applied brushstrokes. The almost life-size figures are cut off by the edges of the picture, in order to make the beholder part of the street scene. In many ways this painting is a fine example of Breitner’s mature style. The features of the girls are rendered in just a few strokes; it is here that Breitner’s depiction of reality crosses the boundaries of pure registration. This highly individual style and disregard for detail made Breitner one of the most outstanding avant-garde artists of his time.

Working together with Van Gogh in the ‘80’s, both artists shared the ambition to sacrifice beauty for the benefit of expression and emotion. Breitner focused on depicting the harsh life of the common people, and wished to become ‘le peintre du peuple’, as he stated in a letter of 1882. In 1886 he moved to Amsterdam, where the city life was an inexhaustible source of inspiration. The busy streets full of trams, carriages and passers by, the servant girls and the workers, the building sites – Breitner was one of the few artists in his time who saw the beauty of it all.

Isaac Israels, with whom Breitner shared a studio from 1888-1891, was mostly impressed by Breitner’s powerful style and was highly influenced by it. After having seen one of Breitner’s paintings in the window at Van Wisselingh Art Gallery, Israels lamented: ‘…it looks beautiful. So beautiful that I did not have the desire to continue my walk and decided to go home. I thought I should quit, I would never equal this, but when I entered my studio I decided to start working hard. (…) His work always gives me a slap in the face, like someone suddenly grasping a simple idea which stupidly enough did not cross his mind.’ 

The Ten Bokkel collection is perhaps the finest ensemble of Breitner’s art ever offered on the international market. Its sale offers a unique opportunity to acquire important works by the artist now recognized as the forerunner of expressionism in the Netherlands. The majority of the works was acquired by the present owner in the 1980’s and exhibited at the major Breitner exhibitions. They give a fascinating review of the themes Breitner used during his career, chosen to express the strength and the emotion behind the subject.

Breitner’s passionate painting is ‘irresistible, (it has) the irresistible of what is real and great’, as Boymans van Beuningen director Hammacher states in the catalogue of the Breitner exhibition in 1954, where ‘Rokin’ of this collection has been exhibited.

A more suitable pronunciation with regard to this collection is hardly imaginable.