Old Masters Figurative Paintings

Circle of Cornelis Pietersz Bega (1631/32-1664) The Beggar Oil on copper, Octagonal Painting Size 11 x 11 in Framed Size 15 x 15 in Cornelis Pietersz Bega was born in either 1631 or 1632 in Haarlem. His grandfather was the renowned history painter Cornelis Cornelisz van Haarlem (Dutch, 1562 - 1638), and his extended family included many other more minor painters, sculptors, and craftsmen. In the spring of 1653 he traveled with the portraitist and still life painter Vincent Laurensz van der Vinne (1628–1702) through Germany, visiting Frankfurt am Main, Heidelberg, Strasbourg, and Basel. Although, like Van der Vinne, he may have intended to continue on to Rome, Bega instead returned to Haarlem in June of that year. He joined the Guild of Saint Luke in 1654. Bega died unmarried in 1664 at the young age of 32, likely a victim of the plague that claimed many lives in Haarlem that year. Dutch artist biographer Arnold Houbraken wrote that Bega was the “first and best pupil” of Adriaen van Ostade (Dutch, 1610 - 1685), a painter of low-life genre scenes. Bega similarly specialized in paintings of jovial taverngoers, smokers, quack doctors, alchemists, and musicians, but he also created tender and sympathetic images of peasant families and nursing mothers. Like Ostade, he also produced etchings, and he may have been one of the first Dutch artists to experiment with monotypes. Bega was also a confident draughtsman, and made numerous chalk drawings remarkable for their sculptural quality. Houbraken wrote that Bega and his close friend Leendert van der Cooghen (1632–1681) frequently drew from life together. Early in his career, Bega painted in a loose, rough style similar to Ostade, although his paintings differ from Ostade’s in that they exhibit a greater degree of monumentality and occasionally include classical elements and figures derived from live models. Bega may have been influenced by the classicizing tradition in Haarlem painting, which he would have known both from the extensive art collection he inherited from his grandfather, as well as from contemporary Haarlem painters who had trained there, such as Salomon (1597–1664) and Jan de Bray...

After William Hogarth The Harlot's Progress A set of six, Oil on canvas Each 12 x 14 3/4 in (30.5 x 37.5 cm) The Harlot's Progress is a series of six paintings (1731, now destroyed) and engravings (1732) by William Hogarth. The series shows the story of a young woman, M. Hackabout, who arrives in London from the country and becomes a prostitute. The series was developed from the third image, after painting a prostitute in her boudoir in a garret on Drury Lane, Hogarth struck upon the idea of creating scenes from her earlier and later life. In the first scene, an old woman praises her beauty and suggests a profitable occupation. A gentleman is shown towards the back of the image. In the second image she is with two lovers: a mistress, in the third she has become a prostitute as well as arrested, in the fourth she is beating hemp in Bridewell Prison. In the fifth scene she is dying...

Philip Mercier (1689-1760) Portrait of Thomas Samwell of Upton Signed Ph Mercier pinxit, Ano 1738 lower right Oil on canvas Canvas size 30 x 25 in (76.2 x 63.5 cm) Framed size 37 x 32 1/2 in Provenance The Collection of Lord Hazlerigg; Sale, Sotheby's, The Contents of Noseley Hall, 28th & 29th September 1998, Lot 62; where purchased by the present owner. Literature Walpole Society, Vol 46, 1976/8 - J.Ingamells and R.Raines: A Catalogue of the Paintings, Drawings and Etchings of Philip Mercier, No. 84 Philip Mercier was born in Berlin, the son of a Huguenot tapestry worker of French extraction who worked for the Elector of Brandenburg (later, 1701, King Frederick of Prussia). Little is documented about his early life, but Vertue tells us that he studied under the French portraitist Antoine Pesne...

Bolognese School (17th Century) Venus and Cupid in an extensive landscape, a shepherd and flock of sheep beyond Oil on canvas Canvas Size - 20 x 27 ...

Gherardo Poli (Florence, 1676 – 1745) and Giuseppe Poli (Florence, 1704 – 1747 Pisa) A Performance from the Commedia dell’Arte set in a Piazza Oil on canva...

Antonio Tempesta (Florence 1555 - 1630 Rome) Adoration of the Magi Signed on the quiver-strap of the black soldier holding the two white horses...

Giovanni Antonio Pellegrini (Venice, 1675 – 1741) Alexander Before the Body of Darius Oil on paper, laid down on canvas 11 ½ x 15 ⅝ inches (29.2 x 39.7 cm) Provenance: Bartolo Bracaglia, New York, by 1961 with P & D Colnaghi, London, December 1971; where acquired by: Private Collection, USA Exhibited: “Venetian Paintings of the Eighteenth Century,” New York, Finch College Museum of Art, 1 October – 16 December 1961, no. 31. Detroit Institute of Arts, November 1964. Literature: A Loan Exhibition of Venetian Paintings of the Eighteenth Century, exhibition catalogue, New York, 1961, cat. no. 31. Giovanni Antonio Pellegrini was Venetian by birth, but an international artist in life. His extensive travels not only shaped his own artistic development, but through his extremely influential work, provided an essential connection between paintings of the Venetian tradition and the Rococo style throughout Europe. At an early age he followed his first master Paolo Pagani to Austria, remaining there for six years. He returned to Italy in 1696 and traveled to Rome in 1700 before returning to Venice two years later. He remained in Venice and the Veneto until 1708, when Charles Montagu (later Duke of Manchester) invited him to England. His later career took him to Germany, France, Flanders, and Austria. Although the present work was previously considered to be by Giovanni Battista Pittoni, Robert L. Manning and later Federico Zeri properly recognized Pellegrini’s authorship of this oil sketch. Our bozzetto relates directly to a large canvas by Pellegrini now in Soissons (Fig. 1). Once thought to represent Achilles viewing the body of Patroclus, the painting rather depicts Alexander the Great with the body of the defeated Persian King Darius...

Circle of Govaert Flinck (Dutch, 1615 – 1660) Allegory of Africa Oil on canvas 14 ¾ x 10 ⅜ inches (37.5 x 26.4 cm) Provenance: Private Collection, United Kingdom Christie’s, South Kensington, 11 July 2003, lot 11, as Follower of Paolo Veronese, sold for £37,600 ($61,307); where acquired by: Private Collection, New York Seventeenth-century Amsterdam was a center of international trade and its port welcomed sailors from across the globe. Many settled in the city, including a complement that established a small African community in the same neighborhood in which Rembrandt maintained his studio. While the Dutch engaged in the trans-Atlantic slave trade, slavery itself was illegal in the Netherlands. Many Black people found employment as servants among Jewish families in the quarter, and some worked additionally as models for Rembrandt and his associates. While Black figures frequently populate European paintings as subsidiary figures or elements of exotica, their portrayal in the Amsterdam of Rembrandt’s time was more varied, with a notable avoidance of stereotype and caricature, and an often ennobling depiction of the individual, no doubt engendered by the personal interactions and familiarity that the subjects had with the artists. The present painting is one such example. The sitter is depicted in a direct manner, gazing off to the right, much in the format of traditional portraits of aristocracy. But what might seem a character study—called tronies in Dutch painting—is belied by the figure’s rich accoutrements: a pearl necklace, pearl earrings, lush classical attire, and a jeweled headdress...

Miguel Alcañiz (Valencian, active 1395 – 1447) Saints Peter, Bartholomew, and Paul Tempera on panel 12 ¼ x 26 inches (31.1 x 66 cm) Provenance: Reber ...

Arthur Devis (1712-1787) Portrait of Mrs Bates as a shepherdess, seated, in a blue dress Oil on canvas Signed lower centre canvas size 24 x 16 1/2 in frame size 28 x 21 in Provenanc...

Studio of Philip de Champaigne Portrait of Nicolas Fouquet (1615-1680) Oil on canvas Inscribed with sitters identity on the original canvas Canvas size - 22 x 17 in Framed size - 29 1/2 x 24 in Nicolas Fouquet, marquis de Belle-Île, vicomte de Melun et Vaux (23 February 1615 – 23 March 1680) was the Superintendent of Finances in France from 1653 until 1661 under King Louis XIV. He had a glittering career, and acquired enormous wealth. He fell out of favor, accused of peculation (maladministration of the state's funds) and lèse-majesté (actions harmful to the well-being of the monarch). The king had him imprisoned from 1661 until his death in 1680. Fouquet was born in Paris to an influential family of the noblesse de robe and, after some preliminary schooling with the Jesuits at the age of 13, was admitted as avocat at the Parlement of Paris. While still in his teens, he held several positions of responsibility, and in 1636, at just 20, he was able to buy the post of maître des requêtes for 150,000 livres. In 1640, he married the rich Louise Fourché, who died a year later. From 1642 to 1650, he held various intendancies, at first in the provinces and then with the army of chief minister Cardinal Mazarin and, coming thus in touch with the court, was permitted in 1650 to buy the important position of procureur général to the parlement of Paris. During Mazarin's exile, Fouquet remained loyal to him, protecting his property and keeping him informed of the situation at court. Upon Mazarin's return, Fouquet demanded and received as reward the office of superintendent of the finances (1653), a position that, in the unsettled condition of the government, threw into his hands not merely the decision as to which funds should be applied to meet the demands of the state's creditors but also the negotiations with the great financiers who lent money to the king. The appointment was a popular one with the moneyed class, for Fouquet's great wealth had been largely augmented by his marriage in 1651 to Marie de Castille, who belonged to a wealthy family of the legal nobility in Spain. Fouquet received around 160,000 Livres from the marriage dowry. His own credit, and above all his unfailing confidence in himself, strengthened the credit of the government, while his high position at the parlement (he still remained procureur général) secured financial transactions from investigation. As minister of finance, he soon had Mazarin almost in the position of a supplicant. The long wars, and the greed of the courtiers, who followed the example of Mazarin, made it necessary at times for Fouquet to meet the demands upon him by borrowing upon his own credit, but he soon turned this confusion of the public purse with his own to good account. The disorder in the accounts became hopeless; fraudulent operations were entered into with impunity, and the financiers were kept in the position of clients by official favours and by generous aid whenever they needed it. Fouquet's fortune now surpassed even Mazarin's, but the latter was too deeply implicated in similar operations to interfere, and was obliged to leave the day of reckoning to his agent and successor Jean-Baptiste Colbert. His closest friend, and maybe mistress, was Suzanne de Rougé, the Marquise du Plessis-Bellière. Upon Mazarin's death in 1661, Fouquet expected to be made head of the government; but Louis XIV was suspicious of his poorly disguised ambition, and it was with Fouquet in mind that he made the well-known statement, upon assuming the government, that Louis would be his own chief minister. Colbert, perhaps seeking to succeed Fouquet, fed the king's displeasure with adverse reports upon the deficit and made the worst of the case against Fouquet. The extravagant expenditures and displays of the superintendent's wealth served to intensify the ill will of the king. Fouquet had bought the port of Belle-Île-en-Mer and strengthened the fortifications with a view to taking refuge there in case of disgrace. He had spent enormous sums in building a magnificent château on his estate of Vaux-le-Vicomte, which in extent, magnificence and splendour of decoration was a forerunner of the Palace of Versailles and where he brought together three artists that the King would later take up for Versailles: the architect Louis Le Vau, the painter Charles Le Brun, and the garden designer André le Nôtre. Here he gathered the rarest manuscripts, paintings, jewels and antiques in profusion, and above all surrounded himself with artists and authors. The table was open to all people of quality, and the kitchen was presided over by François Vatel. Jean de La Fontaine, Pierre Corneille and Paul Scarron were a few of the many artists who enjoyed his patronage. The coat of arms of Fouquet's family traditionally showed a squirrel and bore the motto "Quo non ascendet?" ("What heights will he not scale?"). The symbol can be found in many rooms and decorations at Vaux-le-Vicomte. The choice of this animal derives from the name foucquet, which in the dialect of Angers (in the west of France) means squirrel. By August 1661, Louis XIV was already set upon Fouquet's destruction (his disgrace was secretly decided upon on 4 May). Louis was entertained at Vaux with a fête rivaled in magnificence by only one or two others in French history, at which Molière's Les Fâcheux was produced for the first time. The splendour of the entertainment sealed Fouquet's fate. But the king, then only 22 years old, was afraid to act openly against so powerful a minister. As Superintendent, Fouquet headed the enormously wealthy and influential corps of partisans (tax farmers), who, if challenged as a group, could have caused the king serious trouble. By crafty devices, Fouquet was induced to sell his office of procureur général, thus losing the protection of its privileges, and he paid the price of it into the treasury. After his visit to Vaux, the king announced that he was going to Nantes for the opening of the meeting of the provincial estates of Brittany. He required his ministers, including Fouquet, to go with him. When Fouquet was leaving the council chamber, flattered with the assurance of the king's esteem, he was arrested by Charles de Batz-Castelmore d'Artagnan, lieutenant of the king's musketeers. The trial lasted almost three years, and its violation of the forms of justice is still the subject of frequent monographs by members of the French bar. Louis acted throughout "as though he were conducting a campaign"[citation needed], evidently fearing that Fouquet would play the part of a Richelieu. A report of his trial was published in the Netherlands, in 15 volumes, in 1665-67, in spite of the remonstrances which Colbert addressed to the Estates-General. A second edition under the title of Oeuvres de M. Fouquet appeared in 1696. During the trial, French public sympathy turned to support Fouquet. La Fontaine, Madame de Sévigné, Jean Loret, and many others wrote on his behalf; but when Fouquet was sentenced to banishment, the king, disappointed, "commuted" the sentence to imprisonment for life. In December 1664, Fouquet was taken to the prison fortress of Pignerol. There, Eustache Dauger, the man identified by historical research as the Man in the Iron Mask but whose name was never spoken or written, served as one of Fouquet's valets. His wife was not allowed to write to him until 1672; she was allowed to visit him only once, in 1679. The former minister bore his imprisonment with fortitude and composed several translations and devotionals in prison Philippe de Champaigne...

Giuseppe Antonio Pianca (Valsesia 1703 – ca. 1762 Milan) Mother and Child Oil on canvas 9 ¼ x 8 ¼ inches (23.5 x 21 cm) Provenance: Private Collection, Vercelli, Italy, until 2014 Private Collection, Italy, until 2020 At first glance, this charming painting presents as an image of the Virgin and Child. However, closer examination reveals that, while steeped in the tradition of religious imagery, this is a secular depiction of a mother with her baby. The presentation of the figures is especially intimate and naturalistic. The mother is depicted in full profile and three-quarter length, cropped just below her arm, which runs along the lower edge of the canvas. She holds the sleeping child tenderly in her arms, inclining her head forward and gently resting her face against its head. The uncommon arrangement of the figures and the striking, pink background of the painting are clear indications of the inventiveness of its author, the 18th-century Italian painter Giuseppe Antonio Pianca. Pianca was born near the northern border of Italy, and his artistic formation centered on the study of Lombard painters. He was particularly influenced by the 17th-century Milanese painters Francesco Cairo and Pier Francesco Mazzucchelli, called Morazzone. Although he worked across several cities in northern Italy, he found considerable success in the city of Novara, and came to be known as Pianca Novarese. Pianca is known best for the dense and agitated brushstrokes that characterize his works, probably influenced by contact with the works of the Genoese painters Valerio Castello and Domenico Piola. The present painting is closely comparable both in manner and style to Pianca’s Holy Family formerly in the Costa Collection (Fig. 1). Our exquisite Mother and Child stands out among Pianca’s works for its bold coloration and the balanced palette of the dark-blue cloak, soft-pink dress, alabaster skin, and dark and light-gray shawls.