Peter Paul Rubens
Peter Paul Rubensc. 1620
National Gallery of Art, Washington DC
Washington, DC, United States
With a slight tilt of his head, Peter Paul Rubens looks out at the viewer, his gaze warm yet penetrating. The image is surprisingly intimate. Rubens, a diplomat and court painter to the regents of the Southern Netherlands, Albert and Isabel, is here shown without the exquisite attire of his gentlemanly status. Instead, he wears a simple fur cloak over a black jacket and white shirt with his hair and beard curly and unkempt. Were this a more formal portrait, he would be wearing the gold chain he received when he was appointed court painter as well as the large-brimmed hat he often donned in self-portraits to hide his baldness. The remarkable informality suggests that a close associate of the master, probably a member of his workshop, executed the Gallery's painting.
This attribution is supported by technical and stylistic evidence. Analysis of the ground and imprimatura layer reveals a manner of preparation consistent with that of Rubens and his workshop. Technical examination of the tree rings in the panel further indicates that it was available for use around 1620, a date that accords well with Rubens's apparent age, 43. However, certain weaknesses in the modeling of the ears and lips, which lack real form and structure, and the surprisingly coarse brushstrokes found in the hair and fur cloak have made it difficult to identify a specific hand, but clearly not the hand of the master himself.
- Title: Peter Paul Rubens
- Creator: Studio of Sir Peter Paul Rubens
- Date Created: c. 1620
- Physical Dimensions: overall: 41.3 x 33.7 cm (16 1/4 x 13 1/4 in.)
- Provenance: S. Robinson, Esq., London.[1] art market, London; private collection, United States; purchased 1926 by (P. Jackson Higgs, New York); sold 1927 to William R. Timken [1866-1949], New York;[2] by inheritance to his widow, Lillian Guyer Timken [1881-1959], New York; bequest 1960 to NGA. [1] An Antwerp inventory of the estate of Alexander Voet, dated 18 February 1689, contained a work that was possibly identical to the Gallery's painting: "Een tronie kael van hooft, van van Dyck tot Rubbens geschildert" ("a portrait with a bold head, painted of Rubens by Van Dyck") (in Jean Denucé, _The Antwerp art-galleries; inventories of the art collections in Antwerp in the 16th and 17th centuries_, Antwerp, 1932: 312). However, NGA 1960.6.33 has certain weaknesses that raise questions about an attribution to Van Dyck, and the possibility is strong that the Gallery's painting is a contemporary replica of Van Dyck's lost original. [2] Frank E. Washburn Freund discusses the painting's earliest known provenance in several articles, each with slightly varying details. In Frank E. Washburn Freund, "A Self-Portrait of Peter Paul Rubens, _International Studio_ 84 (August 1926): 25, he writes about "...this newly discovered painting, which was recently acquired by the gallery of P. Jackson Higgs from an English source..." In Frank E. Washburn Freund, "An Unknown Self-Portrait by Rubens," _Art in America_ 16 (1927): 3-11, he writes both that "the picture...was formerly in the possession of Mr. S. Robinson, St. James's, London, and recently became part of the collection of Mr. Wm. R. Timken in New York," and that it "was found in a London art store a year or two ago and sold to an American collector." In "The Romance of a Rubens' Self-Portrait," a typed manuscript in NGA curatorial files written in 1927 after the exhibition at P. Jackson Higgs that included the painting, he writes that: "The portrait, ...as far as could be ascertained, once belonged to the collection of S. Robinson, Esq. of St. James', London. From England [the London art store where Freund found the painting] it found its way to America where, for a time, it formed part of a private collection till it came into the possession of the above-mentioned gallery [P. Jackson Higgs]."
- Medium: oil on panel
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