Attributed to Gerrit Dou

Single panel is cradled, flat, and appears to be stable. Overall, the picture presents a lovely image with fine retention of detail and paint surface, particularly in the hair and wrinkled skin of the hermit, and in the pages of the prayer book. There is some very minor abrasion to panel at extreme edges, most likely due to abrasion from frame, but these are not disturbing and would be covered up when the picture is framed. The painting is under a varnish that makes it somewhat difficult to read with u.v. That having been said, however, after inspection under u.v., it appears that any retouching is mainly limited to a patch in the upper left hand corner and to (perhaps) a spot on the hermit's cheek at left, but otherwise, the painting appears to be in quite fresh condition, and is recommendable.
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Throughout his career, Gerrit Dou, the so-called "father" of the Leiden school of fijnschilders, borrowed subject matter from his master, Rembrandt van Rijn.  The theme of the hermit at prayer was one that Dou explored early in his development and that he returned to later in his life, with pictures such as Hermit at Prayer, signed and dated 1664, now in the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, acc. no. C128, and Hermit Praying, signed and dated 1670, now in the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, Minneapolis, acc. no. 87.11.  The present painting, a lovely example of Dou's adaptation of Rembrandt, relates most closely to the Rijksmuseum and Minneapolis pictures, thus suggesting a date late in Dou's career.  The carefully placed hermit and his accoutrements are similar in all three compositions.  In each, the artist painted the figure half-length, shown in three-quarter view, and pushed up to the forefront of the picture plane.  This placement forces the viewer to focus on the most expressive elements of the old man – his face, head, and hands – and thus emphasizes the highly intimate act of the hermit's prayer.  In each of these pictures Dou's uncanny ability to capture surface textures is evident in his rendition of the hermit's wrinkled hands, furrowed brows, and unkempt hair; and in his depiction of the layered pages of the scripture and meticulously carved crucifix.  In all three of these works, Dou has included a dessicated tree, a crucifix, a Bible, and a stone arch.  The crucifix, in fact, appears quite frequently in the artist's works and may also be found in Hermit with a Crucifix and a Rosary, in the Rijkmuseum, Amsterdam, inv. no. A88, and Praying Magdalene, formerly with Edward Speelman, London.

The subject of this painting – the retreat into a life of quiet contemplation and austerity – would have had great appeal to 17^th century viewers, and the proliferation of works of the same subject by Dou's imitators and by other artists well into the 18^th century, is testament to the popularity of both this subject and Dou's style.  For example, the Leiden artist Jan van Staveren painted a Hermit Praying, as did Pieter Leermans, whose Hermit is in the Old Masters Picture Gallery, Dresden, no. 1779.  The Flemish artist Pieter Gysels also painted a version of the Rijksmuseum Hermit at Prayer.  That picture was recently offered Vienna, Dorotheum, March 24, 2004, lot 114.         

Two Hermits by Dou that are closely comparable to the present painting were recently on the art market.  A Bearded Old Man that sold, New York, Sotheby's, January 26, 2006, lot 15 for $1,248,000, shows a man with almost identical features in also three-quarter view, his hands clasped similarly in prayer, and Portrait of a Scholar, sold New York, Sotheby's, January 24, 2002, lot 235, for $473,500, depicts another bearded man lost in thought while bent over a large open book.

Hitherto unpublished, Dr. Werner Sumowski identified this picture as a work by Gerrit Dou in a private correspondence of February 2, 1999 (to accompany this lot).