Portrait of a Lady with an Ostrich-Feather Fan
Rembrandtc. 1656/1658
National Gallery of Art, Washington DC
Washington, DC, United States
There is little doubt that these two portraits by Rembrandt van Rijn (see also NGA 1942.9.67) were conceived as pendants, or companion pieces. In both, light illuminates the subjects from exactly the same angle. Unfortunately, the identity of the sitters remains a mystery. The man and woman interact with reserved yet poignant warmth; he gestures toward her while looking at the viewer, and she glances in his direction while holding her feather fan so that it inclines toward him. The woman’s hairstyle and costume, including the elegant yet restrained jewelry, are all datable to the 1650s. The translucent lace collar with the elaborate lower edge that covers her shoulders and continues horizontally across her body is of a type seen in a number of portraits from this period. Her plain white cuffs edged with lace are similar to those in Rembrandt’s painting of A Woman Holding a Pink dated 1656.
The early history of these paintings is shrouded in mystery, but by 1803 they had entered the collection of Prince Nicolai Yusupov (1751–1831) in Saint Petersburg. The first published descriptions of the pair, in 1864, already mention their "extraordinary energy," and the paintings made a tremendous impression at the great Rembrandt exhibition in Amsterdam in 1898. When Nicolai’s great-great-grandson, Prince Felix Yusupov (1887–1967), escaped Russia at the start of the Revolution in 1917, he brought the family jewels and these two Rembrandt paintings with him to London. Joseph E. Widener, the future benefactor of the National Gallery of Art, purchased the pair in 1921 when the Prince’s need for cash forced him to part with his family heirlooms.
- Title: Portrait of a Lady with an Ostrich-Feather Fan
- Creator: Rembrandt van Rijn
- Date Created: c. 1656/1658
- Physical Dimensions: overall: 99.5 × 83 cm (39 3/16 × 32 11/16 in.) framed: 132.08 × 115.25 × 13.97 cm (52 × 45 3/8 × 5 1/2 in.)
- Provenance: Possibly Gerard Hoet, Jr. [d. 1760], The Hague; possibly (sale, by Ottho Van Thol, Huibert Keetelaar, and Pierre Yver, The Hague, 25 August 1760, no. 50).[1] Prince Nicolai Borisovich Yusupov [1751-1831], Saint Petersburg and Moscow, by 1803;[2] by inheritance to his son, Prince Boris Nicolaiovich Yusupov [1794-1849], Moscow and Saint Petersburg; by inheritance to his son, Prince Nicolai Borisovich Yusupov [1827-1891], Saint Petersburg; by inheritance to his daughter, Princess Zinaida [Zenaida] Nikolaievna Yusupova [1861-1939], Saint Petersburg, Yalta, and London;[3] sold 1921 by her son and heir, Prince Felix Felixovich Yusupov [1887-1967],[4] to Joseph E. Widener; inheritance from Estate of Peter A. B. Widener by gift through power of appointment of Joseph E. Widener, Elkins Park, Pennsylvania, after purchase by funds of the Estate; gift 1942 to NGA. [1] Gerard Hoet, _Catalogus of Naamlyst van Schilderijen..._, 2 vols., The Hague, 1752, supplement by Pieter Terwesten, 1770, reprint ed. Soest, 1976, 3: 225, no. 50. The painting is listed as: "Een dito Vrouws-Pourtrait: de weergaa, door denzelven; van de eige groote." [2] On the formation and history of the Yusupov collection see: Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts, _A Scholar's Whim: Collection of Prince Nicolai Borisovich Yusupov_, 2 vols., Moscow, 2001; Oleg Yakovlevich Neverov, _Great Private Collections of Imperial Russia_, New York and St. Petersburg, 2004: 89-102; State Hermitage Museum, _Collectors in St. Petersburg_, exh. cat., Hermitage Amsterdam, Zwolle, 2006: 23, 37-47. The German traveller Heinrich Christoph von Reimers (1768-1812) visited the collection in 1803 when it was housed in the family's palace on the Fontanka River in Saint Petersburg; his description of it, published in 1805, mentions the Gallery's painting, and its pendant NGA 1942.9.67. See Heinrich Christoph von Reimers, _St. Petersburg, am Ende seines Ersten Jahrhunderts_, 2 vols., Saint Petersburg, 1805: 2:373. The spelling of the family name takes a variety of forms in the literature, reflecting different transliterations of the Cyrillic letters; among them are: Youssoupoff, Yussupov, Jussupov, and Yussupoff. [3] The princess was the wife of Felix Felixovich, count Sumarokov-Elston (1856-1928), but she was the last surviving representative of the Yusupov family, and her husband was given the right to take his wife's surname and title. The Yusupov art collection, however, was hers, and, after the death in 1908 of her first son, Nicolai, the heir to it became her second son, Felix. [4] The Yusupov collection, including the two portraits by Rembrandt, was moved in 1811 from Saint Petersburg to the family's Arkhangelskoye estate near Moscow, where it survived Napoleon's invasion of Russia during 1812, and was returned again to Saint Petersburg in 1837 to a new family palace on the Moika River. It remained there until sometime after the Russian Revolution of 1917, when much of the collection was seized by the Bolshevik government. The two Rembrandt paintings, however, were smuggled out of the Moika Palace.at some point prior to April 1919, when Prince Felix Felixovich Yusupov, his wife and parents, and other members of the Russian nobility left Yalta aboard a British ship. The paintings were taken by the prince to London, where negotiations for their sale began.
- Medium: oil on canvas transferred to canvas
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