ISACK VAN OSTADE | LANDSCAPE WITH A PEASANT GUIDING HIS WIFE, SURROUNDED BY A GROUP OF CHILDREN

Private collection, Switzerland;

Anonymous sale, New York, Sotheby's, 25 January 2007, lot 437;

There acquired.

From photographs, Dr. Bernhard Schnackenburg has identified this as an early work by Isack van Ostade, probably dating to circa 1640. It compares in style, size, and technique to another signed and dated example by the artist, A Bagpipe Player Surrounded by Children Before a Farm House.¹  A related drawing of the same composition by Ostade was formerly in the collection of Anton Schmid, Vienna.² 

1. Oil on panel, 34 by 47 cm., signed and dated Isack v ostaden 1640.  See Catalogue des Nouvelles Acquisitions de la Collection Goudstikker, exhibition catalogue, Amsterdam 1928, cat. no. 28, reproduced.  

2. See B. Schnackenburg, Adriaen van Ostade/ Isack van Ostade, Hamburg 1981, p. 175, cat.no. 421 reproduced.