Workshop of Jacob Ochtervelt

Figures in an interior with a grape-seller at the door

Lot Closed

December 5, 02:53 PM GMT

Estimate

20,000 - 30,000 GBP

Lot Details

Description

Property from a Swedish Private Collection

Workshop of Jacob Ochtervelt

Rotterdam 1634 - 1682 Amsterdam

Figures in an interior with a grape-seller at the door

oil on canvas

unframed: 80.7 x 61 cm.; 31 3/4 x 24 in.

framed: 109.5 x 89 cm.; 43 1/8 x 35 in.

Harold Harmsworth, 1st Viscount Rothermere (1868-1940), London, 1932;
His posthumous sale, London, Christie's, 19 December 1941, lot 89 (as Ochtervelt);
With Dr. F. Drey, London, before 1946;
Gösta Stenman, Stockholm, 1947;
Thence by descent until sold, Stockholm, Stockholms Auktionsverk, 10 December 2019, lot 2476 (as Attributed to Ochtervelt);
Where acquired by the present owner.

P.G. Konody, Works of Art in the Collection of the Viscount Rothermere, London 1932, cat. no. 53, reproduced pl. 53 (as Ochtervelt);
G. Stenman, Gamla Tiders Mästare, Stockholm 1947, p. 22, cat. no. 48, reproduced pl. 26 (as Ochtervelt);
S.D. Kuretsky, The Paintings of Jacob Ochtervelt (1634-1682), Oxford 1979, p. 76, cat. no. 54-A, reproduced fig. 131 (as a copy of the Hermitage painting, location unknown).

This is a reduced variant of Ochtervelt's signed and dated canvas from 1669 (81 x 66.5 cm.), today in the State Hermitage Museum, Saint Petersburg (inv. no. 951);¹ its signed pendant depicting a Fish Seller is also in the Hermitage (inv. no. 952),² of which a cropped variant also exists (formerly with Schlichte Bergen, Amsterdam).³

Jacob Ochtervelt was born in Rotterdam, but like his fellow townsman Pieter de Hooch, studied painting in Haarlem with Nicholas Berchem. He probably entered the studio shortly after Berchem returned from Italy in 1646, and his earliest paintings reflect the Italianate influences of his teacher. However, by 1660 he had focused on the genre scenes that made him one of Rotterdam's leading artists in the field and for which he is most famous today. The majority of his works depict contemporary scenes of well-to-do citizens in comfortable interiors, and reflect the influence of Frans van Mieris and the Leiden school.

¹https://rkd.nl/en/explore/images/40427

² https://rkd.nl/en/explore/images/40432

³S.D. Kuretsky, The Paintings of Jacob Ochtervelt (1634-1682), Oxford 1979, p. 77, cat. no. 55-A, reproduced fig. 133.