Lot 81: f - JAN VAN CALL THE ELDER NIJMEGEN 1656 - 1706 (?) THE HAGUE

f - JAN VAN CALL THE ELDER NIJMEGEN 1656 - 1706 (?) THE HAGUE

VIEW OF THE RHINE, WITH THE VILLAGE OF ST. GOAR AND CASTLE RHEINFELS IN THE DISTANCE

VIEW OF THE RHINE, WITH THE VILLAGE OF ST. GOAR AND CASTLE RHEINFELS IN THE DISTANCE

measurements note
111 by 112mm (image diameter 105mm)

pen and grey ink and watercolour over black chalk, in black ink drawn circle, within the remains of gold framing lines

PROVENANCE

Hans van Leeuwen, Amerongen (L.2799a),
his sale, Amsterdam, Christie's, 24 November 1992, lot 44

NOTE

Jan van Call is one of the most distinctive Dutch topographical draughtsmen of the second half of the 17th Century. His airy, colourful landscapes and views of the Rhine and of various Dutch towns and castles are rather rare outside of museum collections.

A volume of his working sketches, containing some thirty-five views of cities along the Rhine and the Main, was sold, London, Sotheby's, 2-3 May 1985 (Atlases, Travel and Topography), lot 170, and a set of nineteen similar views was engraved, either by the artist or by his son of the same name, and published in Amsterdam by Petrus Schenk (Hollstein 1478-1496; undated).

Two similar, circular, views of the Rhine in watercolour are in the Rijksprentenkabinet, Amsterdam (inv. nos. 1921-6, 1921-7; see K. Honnef et al, Vom Zauber des Rheins Ergriffen, exhibition catalogue, Cologne/Bonn 1992, pp.166-7, 327, cat. nos. 1-2). Interestingly, a drawing by van Call of the same view as here but in red chalk, a highly unusual medium for the artist, is in the Kölnisches Stadtmuseum, Cologne (see K. Honnef et al, op.cit, p.327, cat no. 4).