Hendrick Heerschop Haarlem circa 1620/1 - in or after 1674

In keeping with the tradition practiced by Rembrandt and his Amsterdam studio, where the artist studied circa 1642, Heerschop depicts a moment from classical antiquity: the fabled meeting between Alexander the Great and Diogenes, the founder of the Cynic School of Greek philosophy.  The philosopher was said to have inhabited a barrel belonging to the Temple of Cybele, living a life of austerity.  When Alexander, who had been seeking the great philosopher, finally found him, the conqueror asked, “How can I serve you,” to which Diogenes is reported to have responded, “You can step out of my sunlight.”  Alexander is said to have walked away from this meeting wishing he should be Diogenes, if being Alexander the Great were not enough.

In this painting Heerschop reveals the stylistic influence of both Rembrandt and Heerschop's fellow Haarlem artists, Salomon and his son, Jan de Bray.  Like these artists, Heerschop uses a palette of mainly browns and other muted tones, with highlights of color and brightness where light hits solid forms.  He arranges the composition on a series of diagonals - created by such devices as the receding horizon of the buildings, Alexander’s outstretched arm, the open door of the barrel, and the pointed spear of the soldier in background – to enhance a sense of depth and drama.  Heerschop also gives the viewer the sensation that the action takes place beyond the confines of the canvas: the onions and carrot in the foreground looks as though they could topple off the edge of the canvas, the little boy seems to be smiling at something out to the left, and Diogenes stretches is arm out towards the viewer. 

This picture can be compared to Heerschop’s Abigail Offering Food and Drink to David (sold New York, Sotheby’s, October 14, 1999, lot 78).  The figure of the little blond boy with curly hair and pudgy cheeks correspond in both pictures, and the soldiers in each are clustered in much the same manner.  The present picture may also be compared to Heerschop’s, Rebecca receiving presents from Abraham’s Servant, dated 1656.  In each, the buildings are arranged in a receding diagonal down the right side of the composition, which pushes the main action to the right front of the composition and into the viewer’s space, while constricting the secondary dramatic action to the left side.  Also, in Rebecca, the jug is pushed up right into the viewer’s space, and Heerschop uses the same geometries in the buildings and in the steps of Rebecca’s platform.  All three pictures, Alexander, Abigail, and Rebecca are of almost the exact same dimensions.

Many of the above-mentioned compositional tools employed by Heerschop in this picture – the overlapping diagonals, the motifs from classical antiquity, the relief-like arrangement of the figures, and the muted palette – were taken up by later Neo-Classical artists, most notably Jacques-Louis David (1748 – 1825).  See, for example, fig. 1, David’s Belissarius, now in the Musée des Beaux-Arts, Lille.