A painting from Rembrandt’s entourage for the Nationalmuseum in Stockholm

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24/3/23 - Acquisition - Stockholm, Nationalmuseum - Carel Fabritius ? Willem Drost ? Neither of these two painters, to whom it was successively attributed, is probably the author of this fascinating painting (ill. 1). It was therefore offered for sale in New York in the Sotheby’s sale of the Fisch-Davidson collection (see news item of 24/1/23) as an "artist active in the circle of Rembrandt van Rijn", a vague description that will hardly be disputed.


1. Dutch school, ca. 1640-1650
Young Boy Sleeping With an Open Book
Oil on canvas - 63 x 63 cm
Stockholm, Nationalmuseum
Photo: Sotheby’s
See the image in its page

If the artist is uncertain, one thing is not: its exceptional quality. The image is indeed striking of this young boy asleep in front of a book he was reading and who seems not to care who may have painted him.
The work is almost monochrome, composed solely of variations between brown and grey. Even the face, the sleeve of the garment, which we can guess is rather white, and the book are painted in this dark tone, barely illuminated by an invisible candle, but which we imagine is dying outside the field of the painting.

The Nationalmuseum in Stockholm, whose remarkable acquisition policy we often mention on this site is well known, was not mistaken: it was indeed the one that won this work at auction.

Does the realism of this painting make it a simple genre scene? Is it an intimate, friendly portrait? Or is there a hidden allegorical meaning? W. Sumowski, one of the art historians who studied this painting (he attributed it to Drost at the time), suggested that it might be an allegory of Acedia, a rare term meaning "a spiritual state of melancholy due to indifference, discouragement or disgust", represented as it is here by a sleeping figure with his head remaining on his hand. While this interpretation cannot be dismissed, it is not the most certain. Perhaps, as in many 17th-century paintings (especially still lifes), two interpretations are possible: one more prosaic, the other more intellectual.


2. Rembrandt Van Rijn (1606-1669)
Sleeping Old Woman, c. 1630
Engraving
London, The British Museum
Photo: The British Museum
See the image in its page

If the painting can thus be compared to Rembrandt, in the 1630s-1640s, it should be noted that he produced several works in which a figure sleeps in this uncomfortable position. Perhaps the closest to the painting acquired by Stockholm is the engraving of a sleepy old woman from the 1630s (ill. 2).

In recent weeks, between Tefaf, the Salon du Dessin, various recent sales[[Note however that Sotheby’s postponed the Géricault sale last night due to the incidents in the streets of Paris. We do not yet know when (see news item of 22/3/23)] or still to come (let us note for example this afternoon at Rémy Le Fur at the Hôtel Drouot several drawings by Girodet), French and foreign museums (and several times again the Nationalmuseum) have multiplied their acquisitions. We will not lack articles on acquisitions in the coming months...

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