Lot 166: JAN STOLKER AMSTERDAM 1724 - 1785 ROTTERDAM

A WOMAN IN A NICHE BLOWING ON COALS IN AN EARTHWARE POT

measurements note
322 by 245 mm

inscribed recto : J:Stolker Del: ad Exim:Pict: G^d.Schalken in poses:vir Nobilis:J:Snelle Rotterod: and verso, in the hand of Ploos van Amstel: Naar 't orrigineel van G^dSchalken/in't kabinet van de Heer Jan Snelle te Rotterdam/gevolgt door J:Stolker./Hoog 12 1/2.Breet 91/2 duym.

watercolour and gouache

PROVENANCE

Jan Stolker, Rotterdam,
his deceased sale, Rotterdam, 27 March 1786, lot 192;
Cornelis Ploos van Amstel, Amsterdam (L.2034, with his inscriptions, see above).

NOTE

This watercolour must be based on a lost original by Godfried Schalken, otherwise known today only through a very damaged studio version, now in the Musée Bertrand, Châteauroux (see T. Beherman, Godfried Schalcken, Paris 1988, cat. no. 304). As Ploos van Amstel's inscription on the verso indicates, the original painting was in the collection of the Rotterdam merchant and sugar refiner Jan Snellen (1711-1787), who was a celebrated collector of objets d'art and naturalia, as well as paintings and drawings. Snellen was personally acquainted with many leading scientists of the day, and also with renowned collectors such as Cornelis Ploos van Amstel, who owned this drawing.

Unlike Snellen's collection of naturalia, sold at auction in Rotterdam in 1787, his art collection was never fully documented, remaining in the posession of his descendants. A splendid portrait of the collector and his family by Aert Schouman was until recently in the Unicorno Collection (sold, Amsterdam, Sotheby's, 19 May 2004, lot 217, now in the Boijmans van Beuningen Museum, Rotterdam; for further information see also R.J.A. te Rijdt, "Een 'nieuw' portret van een 'nieuwe' verzamelaar van kunst en naturaliën: Jan Snellen geportretteerd door Aert Schouman in 1746", in Oud Holland, vol. 110, no. I, 1997, p. 22-53).

See also the following lot.