Hans Bol

See note to the previous lot.

As Stefaan Hautekeete has described in his illuminating article on the artist’s working methods,¹ Hans Bol frequently based his finished gouaches on studies executed in pen and ink or silverpoint, which do not necessarily correspond precisely to the composition of the finished gouache, and rarely include any of the final staffage. In this case, the preliminary study, in silverpoint, is in the British Museum.²

Dr. Hautekeete has kindly informed us that as far as he knows, Bol represented the theme of The Good Samaritan no fewer than nine times, making it one of his favourite subjects. It has been speculated that this may be the result of his personal experiences during the invasion of Mechelen by Spanish troops in 1572, when, according to the often rather imaginative biographer Karel van Mander, Bol fled to Antwerp, leaving behind everything he owned, and was taken in there by a man named Antoon Couvreur. 

The other works by the artist representing this subject include a gouache in the P. & N. de Boer Foundation, pen and ink drawings in Zürich (1567), Rotterdam (1580) and Konstanz (1584), and various prints after designs by Bol. 

We are most grateful to Stefaan Hautekeete for his kind help while cataloguing this lot. 

^1. S. Hautekeete, ‘New Insights into the Working Methods of Hans Bol,’ Master Drawings, vol. 50, no. 3 (Autumn 2012), pp. 329-356

^2. London, British Museum, inv. no. 1895,0915.1038