Hendrik de Clerck

The actual painting is warmer and less red in tone than the catalogue illustration suggests. The panel consists of three planks, joined vertically, and is bevelled on the upper and lower sides. The joins have been reinforced each with ca. 10 battons on the reverse. A vertical crack of approx. 25 cm. in the upper left corner, has been reinforced on the reverse with 6 smaller battons. Tiny flecks of paint loss are visible along the right join. A thin and small horizontal split is running from the join in the upper left, and there's a thin vertical surface scratch to the lower right. The dark blue in the draperies is abraded, but otherwise, the paint surface seems to be in very good condition. Few small retouchings can be observed in the putto most left, in the head-dress and aureole of the Virgin, and along the joins. The paint surface is under a dirty and uneven layer of varnish. Inspection under Ultra-Violet light is partially impeded by the dirty varnish layer, but does confirm the aforementioned retouchings and reveals a few additional small retouchings in the beard of Josef, in the knees of the shepherd on the right, and in the hair of the standing angel. Offered in a plain parcel-gilt black wood frame, with a few scratches. (MW)
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During his lifetime Hendrik de Clerck was considered a pre-eminent painter in his hometown of Brussels, but despite this relatively little is known of his life. In 1586 he became the pupil of Maerten de Vos (1532-1593) in Antwerp, but by 1587 he was already recorded in Rome working with Frans van den Kasteele.¹ In 1594 he returned to Brussels where he worked as official court painter firstly for the Archduke Ernst, and after his death in 1596, for the new Archduke Albrecht and his wife Isabella.

De Clerck painted religious scenes and mythological subjects, and was particularly employed for churches in the Brussels area, for which he painted numerous large religious compositions, such as the present work. Stylistically he belongs to the generation of late Antwerp Mannerist  painters such as Otto van Veen and Abraham Janssens who preceded Rubens and the Flemish Baroque. In this painting De Clerck shows himself decidedly mannerist in the soft modelling of the flesh, and in the muscular forms and posture of the shepherd on the right. His use of colour and light is unusually subtle; the variety in brown and red tones and the soft glow in the faces of the figures create a warm and unusually intimate atmosphere appropriate to the subject. Several other autograph treatments of the subject are known, for example the signed picture sold, London, Sotheby's, 3 July 1991, lot 39, and that sold, London, Sotheby's, 1 April 1992, lot 224.²

 

1. See H. Vlieghe, Flemish Art and Architecture 1585-1700, New Haven/London 1998, p. 15.
2. Reproduced in M. Roethlisberger, Abraham Bloemaert and his sons, Doornspijk 1993, vol. II, cat. no. C22, plate 332.