Lot 20: Dirck van Delen (Heusden 1604/5-1671 Arnemuiden)

Dirck van Delen (Heusden 1604/5-1671 Arnemuiden)
An elegant company dining in a richly decorated palace interior
signed 'D.V.DELEN' (lower right)
oil on panel
23 5/8 x 35 5/8 in. (60 x 90.5 cm.)

Worcester, 1882.
Leeds, Municipal Art Gallery, Spring Exhibition, 1889.

G.F. Waagen, Treasures of Art in Great Britain, III, 1854, p. 220, 'Dirck van Delen - A party at a meal in a large saloon. Inscribed. Delicately and clearly carried out, in a silvery tone'.

Joseph Strutt (1765-1844), Mayor of Derby, and by descent to his daughter,
Isabella Galton, née Strutt, wife of John Howard Galton, Hadzor House, Worcestershire, where seen by Dr. Waagen in the Dining Room in 1850, and thence by descent to their grandson,
Captain Hubert George Howard Galton (1854-1928); [The Hadzor Collection of Pictures by Old Masters ... formed in the early part of the century by Joseph Strutt, Esq., of Derby], Christie's, London, 22 June 1889, lot 22 (252 gns. to Fraser).
with Gooden and Fox, London.
Eunice, Lady Oakes, wife of Sir Harry Oakes, 1st Bt (1874-1943), gold prospector and philanthropist, and by descent.
Anonymous sale [From a Private Collection, Sold by order of the beneficiaries]; Christie's, London, 20 July 1973, lot 152, sold £7,500.
with The Leger Galleries, London, 1974, from whom acquired by the late owner.

THE PROPERTY OF A FAMILY
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Admired by Waagen in the mid-nineteenth century for its delicacy and silvery tone, this is an exceptionally well-preserved example of Dirck van Delen's mature output. The bright palette, with a prevailing use of pink, and the sophisticated rendering of light flooding into the hall through the windows on the left side, point to a date in the late 1630s or 1640s, when the artist was producing some of his most exuberant architectural compositions. Van Delen was strongly influenced in this by the Antwerp Baroque style, as can be seen in the proliferation of sculpture that adorns the marble doorway and the chimneypiece opposite. The figurative element has traditionally, and quite plausibly, been ascribed to van Delen's contemporary Jan Olis (1610-1676), in whose work the seated woman with her back turned to the viewer is a recurrent motif.