Attributed to Jan de Momper Antwerp 1617 - after 1687

Private Collection, New York

A series of at least eighteen drawings of coast landscapes and harbour scenes by this same, distinctive hand are known, including seven sheets in the Hermitage, St. Petersburg, six in the collection of the Duke of Roxburghe at Floors Castle, two in Hamburg and one formerly in the Nijstad Collection (sold, Amsterdam, Sotheby's, 19 May 2004, lot 107; see catalogue for further information). In the past, these drawings have been attributed to various 17th-century artists, most frequently Abraham Casembrot, Filippo Napoletano and Remigio Cantagallina.  Four of the eighteen drawings do, however, bear the signature Momper, and in one case (one of the drawings at Floors), this name is preceded by the initial I.  These signatures may perhaps be later additions, but one of the later members of the Momper family, Jan III, is supposed to have been working in Rome in 1675, and did paint Mediterranean coast landscapes, so it seems perfectly reasonable to attribute the drawings to that artist.