Lot 289: JAN VAN KESSEL

JAN VAN KESSEL AMSTERDAM 1641-1680 A WINTER LANDSCAPE bears signature lower left: I.V. CAPPELLE oil on canvas 45 1/2 by 52 7/8 in.; 115.7 by 134.3 cm.

Cologne, Wallraf-Richartz Museum, Die Sammlung Henle, 22 February - 5 April 1964, no. 7 (as Jan van de Cappelle).

H. Vey, with an introduction by G. von der Osten, Die Sammlung Henle, exhibition catalogue, Wallraf-Richartz Museum, Cologne 1964, no. 7, reproduced (as Jan van de Cappelle);
M. Russell, Jan van de Cappelle 1624/6-1679, Leigh-on-Sea 1975, p. 91, Addenda no. 25 (as by an unknown follower of Van de Cappelle);
M. Russell, "A Winter Landscape after Jan van de Cappelle," in The Burlington Magazine, vol. CXXX, no. 1025, August 1988, p. 607, note 8;
A.I. Davies, Jan van Kessel, Doornspijk 1992, p. 192, no. 115, reproduced pl. 115.

Private Collection, Switzerland;
With Heinz Kisters, Kreuzlingen, Switzerland;
From whom acquired by Günter and Anne Liese Henle, Duisburg, Germany, 1963;
Their deceased sale (The Henle Collection Old Master Paintings), London, Sotheby's, 3 December 1997, lot 13;
There purchased by the present collector.

Bearing the signature of Jan van de Cappelle, this painting had previously been attributed to that master until 1992 when Alice Davies identified it as the work of van Kessel (see Literature). Davies linked the present composition to other dated winter scenes by van Kessel, specifically a Winter Scene formerly in the Stenman collection of Stockholm (Davies, op. cit., p. 195, no. 120, reproduced plate 120). Having distinguished provenance, this painting was once part of both the Kisters and Henle collections.