Bust of a Bearded Man
Gerrit Douc. 1642/1645
National Gallery of Art, Washington DC
Washington, DC, United States
In this intimate portrait, a bearded man with piercing eyes gazes to his right, his weathered face brightly illuminated against his dark beret. Bright accents enliven his eyes and help model his forehead and cheek bones, while similar highlights define the folds of his open shirt and articulate the strands of his grey hair. Dou's expressive brushwork and detailed handling of paint bring an extraordinary vigor and animation to this wonderful image. This work was once believed to represent Dou's father—a romantic notion that has since been proven wrong by a confirmed image of him with a darker beard and rounder face.
Dou's small oval panel is an outstanding example of a _tronie_, a type of figure study popular among Dutch artists. Among them, Rembrandt van Rijn, Dou's teacher, made many of these studes in the early to mid-17th century. Dou made _tronies_ of both young and old models, though he favored the old, because their time-worn faces seemed to convey notions of wisdom and experience. _Tronies_ were often sold as independent works, but they were also commonly used by artists as studies for their own genre and history paintings.
- Title: Bust of a Bearded Man
- Creator: Gerrit Dou
- Date Created: c. 1642/1645
- Physical Dimensions: overall (oval): 18.41 × 14.92 cm (7 1/4 × 5 7/8 in.) framed: 34 x 30.2 x 5.4 cm (13 3/8 x 11 7/8 x 2 1/8 in.)
- Provenance: Possibly[1] Jacques Ignace de Roore, Antwerp;[2] (his estate sale, The Hague, 4 September 1747, no. 89, with pendant). possibly Johan van der Marck, Leiden; (his estate sale, by Hendrik de Winter and Jan Yver, Amsterdam, 25 August 1773 and days following, no. 66).[3] possibly (sale, Hôtel d'Aligre by Alexandre Joseph Paillet, Paris, 17 February 1777 and days following, 1st day, no. 79); (Jacques Langlier, Paris).[4] possiby Gilbert Paignon Dijonval [1708-1792], Paris;[5] by descent to his grandson, Charles-Gilbert, vicomte Morel de Vindé [1749-1852]; (his sale, by Charles Paillet and N. Bérnard, Paris, 17 December 1821 and days following, no. 21 bis); (Thomas Emmerson, London). possibly Jeremiah Harman [1763-1844], London, by 1842;[6] (his estate sale, Christie and Manson, London, 17-18 May 1844, no. 33); Robert Clouston [d. 1882], Balrath, near Navan, co. Meath, Ireland; (sale, Christie, Manson & Woods, London, 18 June 1881, no. 116); James.[7] Gottfried von Preyer [1807-1901], Vienna, by 1901;[8] (sale, 1902); purchased by William A. Clark [1839-1925], New York; bequest 1926 to the Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington; acquired 2014 by the National Gallery of Art. [1] This provenance puts together chronologically all the histories attached by a number of authors to various paintings that might be identified with the Gallery's painting; hence, through the 1881 sale, many "possiblys" are added to the text. The first author to do this was James Douglas Breckenridge, _A Handbook of Dutch and Flemish Paintings in the William Andrews Clark Collection_, Washington, 1955: 13 note. There is uncertainty identifying the Gallery's painting in the sale catalogue descriptions, in which the painting is often described as a portrait of the artist's father, and the authors sometimes describe separate paintings that might be the same one. See: John Smith, _A Catalogue Raisonné of the Works of the Most Eminent Dutch, Flemish and French Painters_, 9 vols., London, 1829–1842: 1(1829):19, no. 55 [1777 Du Barry collection sale]; 34, no. 99 [Paignon Dijouval _sic_ collection bought 1821 _en bloc_ by Mr. Emmerson]; 9 (1842):18, no. 58 [Paignon de Dijonval, Emmerson, J. Harman]; Ernst Wilhelm Moes, _Iconographia Batava_, Vol. 1, Amsterdam, 1897: 483, no. 3984/2 [De Roore 1747] and 3 [Coulston _sic_ 1881, J. Harman 1844]; Wilhelm Martin, _Het Leven en de werken van Gerrit Dou_, Leiden, 1901: 203, no. 135 [Paignon Dijonval _sic_, Harman 1843]; Cornelis Hofstede de Groot, _Beschreibendes und kritisches Verzeichnis der Werke der hervorragendsten holländischen Maler des XVII. Jahrhunderts_,10 vols., Esslingen and Paris, 1907-1928: 1(1907):431, no. 291 [Paignon Dijonval _sic_, Emmerson, Harman 1844, Coulston _sic_ 1881, Von Preyer, Clarke _sic_]; 432, no. 292 [De Roore, 1747, Van der Marck 1773]; 436, no. 319d [Dubarry _sic_ 1777, and identified by the author as possibly the same as no. 292]. [2] This is the name as given in the 1747 sale catalogue. He was probably Jacobus Ignace de Roore, 1686-1747, a painter and art dealer in Antwerp. [3] Yver's name appears beside this lot (and lot number 67, a woman's portrait) in an annotated copy of the sale catalogue in the NGA Library, indicating the painting might have been bought in. [4] Although some of the paintings in this sale belonged to the comtesse du Barry, and Smith and Hofstede de Groot describe the sale as the Du Barry sale, not all the paintings were hers and the Dou was included in this group; see The Getty Provenance Index Databases, description and contents of Sale Catalog F-A450, where the buyer's name is also recorded. Langlier was a dealer; the painting does not appear in his sale, held 24 April 1786 and the following days at the Hôtel de Bullion in Paris. [5] Smith 1842, 18, no. 58, gives the name as Paignon de Dijonval. [6] Smith 1842, 18, no. 58. [7] Ernst Wilhelm Moes (_Iconographia Batava_, 2 vols., Amsterdam, 1897: 1:483, no. 3984, item 3) is the first author to cite this name, but incorrectly spells it "Coulston" and does not provide details about the 1881 sale. The correct spelling of the name, the identification of the 1881 sale, and the names of the buyers at both the 1844 and 1881 sales were kindly provided by Lynda Mcleod, libarian at Christie's Archives, London (e-mail of 17 April 2015, in NGA curatorial files). [8] Martin 1901, 203, no. 135.
- Rights: CC0
- Medium: oil on panel
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