Monday 4 July 2016

Painting reappears as "Spanish School", but still looks Dutch to me

Quite often I see a painting I discussed reappear at a later auction. I usually note this with an update in the original blog post only, but this one is more interesting.

Tradart, from France, sells on 17 July 2016 a painting that was sold in Brussels in February 2016. It then fetched 1,100 Euro and is now estimated at 1,000 to 1,500 Euro, so apparently the hopes for a profit didn't work out quite so well. The original auction gave no country of origin but a date of 1673: the new auction describes it as "Spanish" but only indicates 17th century. Was the date a later addition or do they hope to avoid people finding the earlier auction too easily?

To me it still looks Dutch, not Spanish at all, and most other examples I have noted with similar red and gold or silver undergarments usually were Dutch as well. Look at woman portraits from this period by Luttichuys, Terborch, Van der Helst, ... A few English and Italian paintings have a somewhat similar pose, but usually not with the kind of dress seen here. But no Spanish examples I'm aware of. I still believe it is worth a bit more than the estimate, but perhaps not with this description.

UPDATE: unsold, again for sale with same estimate and description at Tradart Deauville on 9 October 2016. A hard sell, this one. 

The same auction also has an Italian Virgin and Child, which they first offered in April. I tweeted about it then: it is a simplified copy after Giampetrino. Still, at 1,200 to 1,500 Euro it offers good value for money.


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