Herri met de Bles

Possibly the 2nd Lord Northwick, Thirlestane House, Cheltenham;
His deceased sale on the premises, Philips, 26ff July 1859, either lot 914 or 1777;
Bought back at the sale by his nephew the 3rd Lord Northwick, at Northwick Park by 1864;
His widow, Lady Northwick;
By whom bequeathed to her grandson Captain E.G. Spencer-Churchill, 1912;
His deceased sale, London, Christie's, 28 May 1965, lot 47, for 7,500 Guineas to Hallsborough;
M.A. Hassid, Esq.;
With Hallsborough Gallery, London, 1970;
From whom acquired in 1970 by Günter and Anneliese Henle, Duisburg;
Their sale, London, Sotheby's, 3 December 1997, lot 30, for £133,500 to De Jonckheere;
With Galerie de Jonckheere, Paris, by whom sold to the present collector.

Bristol, 1937, no. 187;
London, Royal Academy, Flemish Art 1300-1700, Winter 1953-4, no. 154;
Namur, Musée des Arts anciens du Namurois, Autour de Henri Bles, 13 May-1 November 2000, no. 12.

A Catalogue of the Pictures, Works of Art, etc. at Northwick Park, 1864 (reprinted 1908), no. 41, as by 'Nieulant;'
T. Borenius, A Catalogue of the Collection of Pictures at Northwick Park, 1921, no. 112;
M.J. Friedländer, Early Netherlandish Painting: From Van Eyck to Bruegel, London 1956, reproduced fig. 186;
L. Van Puyvelde, La peinture flamande au siècle de Bosch et de Bruegel, Paris 1962, p. 227;
W.S. Gibson, 'Mirror of the Earth.' The World Landscape in Sixteenth-Century Flemish Painting, Princeton 1989, pp. 30, 102, note 126;
L. Serck, Henri Bles et la Peinture de Paysage dans les Pay-Bas méridionaux avant Bruegel, unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Louvain, 1990, pp. 371-3;
L. Serck, in J. Toussaint (ed.), Autour de Henri Bles, exhibition catalogue, Namur 2000, p. 176, no. 12, reproduced.

The following condition report is provided by Sarah Walden, who is an external specialist and not an employee of Sotheby's. This painting is on an oak panel, which has been sealed in behind. There is one joint a third of the way up from the base, with a brief crack below it at centre right. The main joint has only minor touches in the landscape, more across the central rock and a band of retouching across the water to the right edge. The lower crack is retouched from the left edge, then through the legs of Joseph and across up to the path at lower right. There is also a brief crack at lower right from the path into the corner. The upper sky has a fairly wide band of retouching along the slightly curved top of the panel, with another band just below across the sky although with the retouching halting as it crosses the rock and recommencing the other side. There are also one or two little vertical scratches in the sky at upper left and a wider scrape retouched towards the right side. Under ultra violet light many little surface touches can be seen scattered across the sky, whereas few are in the landscape itself. The recent treatment of the panel behind was evidently needed and appears to have resolved the previous movement of the wood. The restoration has been well integrated. The fine films of almost transparent original paint are largely intact across the landscape with the delicate detail beautifully preserved. The drawing is visible throughout, as the light brushwork has grown more transparent naturally over time. Exquisite minute cities and castles, others occasionally drawn on the skyline but not filled out, fantasies as well as normal lives continuing within the finely preserved landscape. This report was not done under laboratory conditions.
"This lot is offered for sale subject to Sotheby's Conditions of Business, which are available on request and printed in Sotheby's sale catalogues. The independent reports contained in this document are provided for prospective bidders' information only and without warranty by Sotheby's or the Seller."

Herri met de Bles was the principal follower of Joachim Patinir, the pioneer of landscape painting.  He is probably better known to us than other landscape painters of his day, because he was prolific, and because many of his works are signed with a small owl – a Civetta in Italian - which was his nickname. Max Friedlander seems to have been the first to recognize the signature in the form of the artist's owl device in this painting. He must have been helped in so doing by the figure of Joseph, who is gazing at the owl and points it out with his arm.

Herri's landscapes, always painted in soft pastel tones, are consistent in style and in the delight in he took in repeating motifs.  As Serck pointed out in the catalogue of the exhibition devoted to the artist, the row of cottages in the extreme right is repeated in the landscape backgrounds of several other works by Herri, including two versions of The Parable of the Good Samaritan in Namur and Naples.¹  The fantastic rocky outcrop leaning to the right and pierced with arched openings and with monks ascending a steep rocky path to a hermitage is a motif that derives from Patinir, but which recurs with variations in a number of works by Herri, including a St Jerome also in Namur.²  Herri's landscapes are always wild and exotic, with craggy mountains and distant fertile plains.  Usually there is a distant city and an inlet of the sea extending to a faraway horizon of blue mountains; these are what is known to art historians as `World Landscapes' in which the infinity of distance is emphasized and a broad sweep of landscape encompasses the sum of known geography.

Since none of them are dated, it is very difficult to hazard a chronology of his work, which is remarkably consistent, allowing for little obvious maturing of style.  He was probably the Herry de Patinir who registered as an apprentice in Antwerp in 1540, but we have no idea when he ceased to paint.   

1.  Namur, Musée des Arts anciens du Namurois, inv. 157; Naples, Museo e Gallerie Nazionali di Capodimonte, 1958 cat. No. 674; see Serck under literature, 2000, pp. 182,186,  nos. 14 & 16, both reproduced.
2.  Namur, Musée des Arts anciens du Namurois, inv. 158; see Serck under literature, 2000, pp. 226-7,  no. 35, reproduced.