2020 The Rubenianum

Quarterly 4

A new acquisition for the Rubenshuis: The Corpus in times of pandemic Head of a Bearded Man by Jacob Jordaens On 19 June 1626, Nicolas-Claude Fabri de Last autumn the Rubenshuis succeeded in acquiring a previously unknown head Peiresc reported in a letter to Girolamo study by Jacob Jordaens. The purchase was made possible by a generous donation. Aleandro that their mutual friend Rubens This small, rapidly painted sketch of the head of a bearded man had been hidden is currently still in Antwerp: ‘But he writes away in a private collection in Belgium, unknown to scholars and unrecorded in the to me that the plague is increasing, which literature on the artist. could cause him to leave the city, as he Head studies like the present work were executed by Jordaens early in his career did last year.’ In fact, Rubens had already in particular, in keeping with the Antwerp studio tradition and, more directly, fled the raging plague the year before. under the influence of Rubens. The newly discovered study is similar in handling to On that occasion he perhaps suffered no other studies painted by Jordaens c. 1620–21, including Study for the Head of Saint more than inconvenience, to judge from Christopher, which came up for auction a couple of years ago. In these sketches, a letter he wrote at the end of November. Jordaens uses a heavily loaded brush, applying the paint with short, powerful strokes But in 1626 disaster struck. Isabella Brant and painting alla prima. Interestingly, this work is painted on a sheet of recycled died on 20 June, probably of the very paper, laid down on panel. Along the upper right edge, bits of black handwriting disease that was ravaging Antwerp at the time. Almost four hundred years later, can still be glimpsed by the naked eye below the paint layer. Though unusual, such a pandemic has broken into our modern recycled supports can also be found in head studies made by Rubens and Van Dyck. world with elemental force. And again The practice of painting head studies was common in Antwerp and dates back at people are struck down. Friends and least to the work of Frans Floris (1517–70), who, according to his biographer Karel van colleagues fall ill. There are deaths close Mander, ‘always had a few of those to hand on panel’. Inspired by Italian examples, to home. The grief is paralysing. But the Rubens started to paint head studies during his years in Italy, and produced a large thought of the dead also brings humility. number of them in the decade following his return from the peninsula in 1608. I do not complain about the everyday For Rubens, Van Dyck and restrictions. Although I try to devote the Jordaens alike, head studies time spent in self-imposed quarantine provided a stock of intriguing to the Corpus project, systematic work is faces that could populate hardly possible. Museums and libraries are large-scale history paintings. closed. Letters remain unanswered. Where In fact, Jordaens used the digital copies are still being processed, the present study as the model for overload on the remaining staff means the head of Saint Augustine long delays in delivery. Communication, in his magnificentThe Four which has completely shifted to digital, Doctors of the Latin Church consumes time and energy. Under these (c. 1630) at Stonyhurst College circumstances it was and is not possible in Blackburn (UK), and the to move the Corpus project forward in same bearded man also the way we would have expected. Hope features in Odysseus in the springs from the knowledge that this Cave of Polyphemus (c. 1635), is a shared suffering. And from news of now in the Pushkin Museum in a vaccine that may put an end to this Moscow. epidemic: next year. Then we will catch Head of a Bearded Man up with cancelled trips and have lectures will be displayed in the at the Rubenianum. And then we will Antechambre, where it will complete the next Corpus volumes. join Anthony van Dyck’s superb head study of a young Nils Büttner man, The Apostle Matthew. Secretary of the Editorial Board of the Ben van Beneden Corpus Rubenianum Ludwig Burchard Corpus Rubenianum

Interview with our generous benefactors, A. Gary and Anita Klesch, founders of The Klesch Collection by Prof. Katlijne Van der Stighelen

Q When did you take the first step to These efforts can be seen on The Klesch collecting? Was it a decision you made Collection website. as a couple or on a more individual basis? A We started collecting – always as a Q Are you planning to make art by female couple – soon after we got married. Initially, artists the focus of the collection? we collected modern art for a number of years. A A better description would be that we After Anita got her doctorate in art history want to call attention to very competent in the 2000s, her passion for ‘Old Masters’ women artists who were overlooked in the became very evident and that passion was so sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. We infectious that it eventually took hold in Gary. have five impressive paintings by women artists from that era. While we wouldn’t Q Dr Klesch, has your education as art call it a focus of our collection, it is a very historian and your position as Honorary important part of it and we plan on making Research Fellow at Birkbeck, University of further acquisitions in this area. We are London, played a part in this? proud to be one of the leaders in collecting A Yes and no. Yes, in that it allowed me women artists. to continue researching subjects near and dear to my heart, but also near and dear Q Which genres do you gravitate towards to Birkbeck. No, in that the period we are the most? interested in collecting was not necessarily A Within our focused period, so much of A Yes, we do. We have Joos van Cleve, the only period Birkbeck was interested in the paintings produced were of a religious Jan Brueghel the Elder, Anthony van Dyck researching. nature in the early part of that period and Michaelina Wautier. while increasingly veering towards secular Q What are the criteria by which you decide subjects in the later part. That’s why Q Which artist would you like most to add to purchase a work of art? Is it an emotional these genres are well represented in our to the collection? What would be your dream process or rather a rational decision weighing collection – not by choice, but because they purchase? worth, investment, and whether it matches corresponded to what was being painted at A Caravaggio. the focus of the collection? those various times. A welcome relief for us A First and foremost, a painting has to be is when we see very attractive allegorical Q From your website it seems that the vision in our targeted period of interest which is paintings such as our Patience by Vasari or you have for The Klesch Collection is not only sixteenth- and seventeenth-century European our Four Seasons by Arcimboldo. about building an art collection, but also about painting. Second, we both have to love the contributing to the societal relevance of art painting. Third, we are very disciplined buyers Q Do you have a special interest in Flemish through exhibitions, fellowships, educational and we stick to a strict regime of deliverables art in general? programmes and sponsorships. Can you tell us from any vendor; by that we mean condition A The Flemish art that we own is an a bit more about this? reports, attribution reports, provenance, etc. important, if not vital, part of our collection. A Our commitment to the art world is We have walked away from buying a painting As collectors of sixteenth- and seventeenth- founded on my wife’s passion for art history. that we loved simply because the attribution century Old Masters we couldn’t imagine not We actively seek to share our collection with report was not strong or convincing enough. having adequate representation of Flemish the public for the specific purpose of assisting art and we plan to acquire further Flemish in the interpretation of history. A large part of Q What is currently the focal point of the paintings. what we intend to do is to undertake further collection? Has it evolved much from the research on all of our paintings, produce books, initial focus? Q Why did you decide to purchase produce podcasts to expand the knowledge A The focus of our collection is sixteenth- specifically Rubens’sPortrait of an base of our collection and share it with the and seventeenth-century European painting Unidentified Woman? public. Part of increasing the pool of knowledge and that focus hasn’t changed since we A We fell in love with it and, as we said, in the art world is to ensure that there are started it about seven years ago. that is one of our golden rules. We saw the going to be future generations of art historians, painting at an exhibition and immediately conservationists and curators, and that is Q What do you see as the logical further reacted to it. It was like a magnet drawing why we are prepared to fund scholarships development of the collection? both of us to it at the same time. It was truly for MA or PhD students. It should come as A Our aim is to continue to add to the serendipitous and love at first sight. no surprise that funding exhibitions and/or collection whenever the right opportunity sponsoring events fits nicely into our objective arises. Separately, we hope to invest in Q Do you have other works by Rubens, of expanding the understanding and knowledge education through our scholarship programme Van Dyck and Jordaens or Antwerp base of artists and their role and impact and sponsor various exhibitions or events. contemporaries in the collection? on history.

2 Rubens in Stuttgart: Geronima Spinola and Her Granddaughter Maria Giovanna Serra

Nils Büttner and Anna Orlando

A Rubens exhibition is scheduled for autumn 2021 in Stuttgart. The starting point for this show will be the Rubens works in the Stuttgart collection, some of which are early works by the artist that have never been shown there. Thanks to generous support from the Karlsruhe Kunsthalle, other early paintings by Rubens will be on show, and for the first time in more than a hundred years the two Genoese portraits illustrated here will be shown side by side. In preparation for this exhibition, two specialist conferences were planned in cooperation with the Rubenianum, the first of which had to be cancelled due to the coronavirus pandemic. Véronique Van de Kerkhof, Sandra Diefenthaler and their colleagues involved with the organization in Antwerp and Stuttgart continue to hope that the event planned for late summer 2021 can take place all the same. The speakers for the cancelled Stuttgart conference have been invited to travel to Stuttgart on their own. The first such visit has now resulted in the identification of the sitters in the much-debated portrait of an old lady and a young girl in Stuttgart (inv. 2710; CRLB 1977, no. 45). Wilhelm von Bode had bought this painting before 1890 for the collector Karl von der Heydt (1858–1922). The picture, from the collection of Marchese Paolo Coccapani Imperiale Lercari, was then considered to be the work of Van Dyck. Ludwig Burchard ascribed the portrait to Rubens and proposed that the sitters are members of the Imperiale Lercari family, given the work’s provenance. In 1977 Frances Huemer questioned the traditional identification as Marchesa Bianca Spinola Imperiale and her granddaughter Maddalena Imperiale; but she had no alternative to offer. For over a century there have been attempts to trace the picture back from the noble Genoese family of the Lercari to the early seventeenth century, but in Fig. 1 Peter Paul Rubens, Geronima Spinola and Her Granddaughter Maria Giovanna Serra, vain. The well-known complexity of family canvas, 208 × 132/133 cm. Staatsgalerie Stuttgart, inv. 2710 connections among the Genoese nobility means that one often gets lost among the The identification had already been The provenance of the Karlsruhe numerous homonyms. There are always proposed in 2018 but it is now supported painting is unknown before 1827, when multiple possibilities for the various with an increasing body of evidence of the collection of the late King of Poland transfers of ownership and inheritance documented accessories and jewellery. was sold in London.2 That of the Stuttgart processes, which are mostly hypothetical The painting now in Karlsruhe was painting can only be traced back to and undocumented. Starting from the executed for Geronimo Serra by Rubens, 1890. Given that the two paintings quite recent hypothesis that the portrait in his function as court painter to the of approximately the same size were of a lady kept in the Kunsthalle Karlsruhe Duke of Mantua, Vincenzo I Gonzaga. found together in the early twentieth (inv. 2505; CRLB 1977, no. 43) actually shows Serra was a feudatory of the Duke of century, it seems quite possible that Veronica Spinola Serra (1577–1617), the Mantua and partner of his major banker they belonged together from the very opposite approach has now been taken. Nicolò Pallavicino.1 beginning. Both appear compositionally

3 related to one another. In fact, if we make and those of her husband Geronimo Serra identity: Veronica’s mother, Geronima this assumption, all the pieces fall together di Paolo (1547–1616).3 Spinola di Luca, had lost her husband as in a jigsaw. Not only does it confirm The elderly lady is shown without Giacomo Spinola di Federico in 1604 and the hypothesis about the identity of the jewellery and accessories. She is sitting became a nun after being widowed. In the Karlsruhe sitter, Veronica Spinola Serra, on a rather plain so-called Spanish family genealogy as reconstructed so far, but it also allows us to give a name to the chair. Her face stands out against a red among the children of Luca and Violante two sitters in the Stuttgart painting as curtain, which is fastened with a cord Spinola (Veronica’s maternal grandparents) Veronica’s mother and daughter. from which a large tassel hangs. The veil there was indeed a nun Geronima, whose Research carried out in six different on her head and the severity of her dark biographical details could not be traced parish archives in Genoa between 2017 and dress as well as her sad look are probably and whom we know today to be none 2020 has made it possible to reconstruct references to her widowhood. The white other than Veronica’s mother. Married the genealogies of the immediate family headscarf can be explained as a monastic to Giacomo Spinola in 1570, Geronima of Veronica Spinola, daughter of Geronima garment. These two considerations are decided not to marry again but to wear Spinola from the ‘San Luca’ branch and not mutually exclusive but complement the monastic habit after his death, a choice Giacomo Spinola from the ‘Luccoli’ branch, one another in leading to the lady’s of life which, as the portrait tells us, was suggested to her granddaughter. The name of the latter can be found in the same genealogy: Maria Giovanna, the first female child among Veronica’s thirteen children, was born in 1598. Documents mention her as a nun. The apparent age of the child in the portrait (she may be seven to ten years old) and the dating of the picture on stylistic grounds (between 1604 and 1606) are compatible with the age of Maria Giovanna. She is therefore the girl who posed for Rubens at the age of seven or eight, probably in 1605, and who looks unmistakably like her mother, Veronica. At about the same time, Veronica herself posed for the painting now in Karlsruhe. The luxury manifested in the girl’s clothes and accessories in the Stuttgart painting – abundant gold thread, large collar edged with expensive lace, three large pearls for each earring and an elaborate hairstyle – is something she was soon to leave behind to embrace a life of austerity and chastity. The tassel behind her grandmother’s shoulders also hints at this idea. The solidity of this choice, based on firm principles, is perhaps suggested in the unusual shape of the column and base behind her, where two columns are placed directly above one another. An in-depth study is projected which will elaborate on what is only touched on here and will also try to explain how the painting entered the Lercari family collection. The conference planned in Antwerp for next year and the catalogue of the Stuttgart exhibition scheduled for 22 October 2021–20 February 2022 will publicly present and discuss these results, as well as the outcome of research on the other Rubens paintings in Stuttgart.

1 A. Orlando, in [exh. cat.] Van Dyck e i suoi amici. Fiamminghi a Genova 1600–1640, ed. by A. Orlando, Genoa 2018, pp. 304–11; A. Orlando, ‘I soggiorni di Rubens a Genova, i dipinti per le famiglie Pallavicino e Serra e nuove identificazioni per alcuni ritratti genovesi’, in La dama genovese con l’orecchino di perle. I Serra e le rotte del collezionismo tra Fiandra, Italia e Spagna, Genoa 2020, pp. 50–81. 2 P. Boccardo and A. Orlando, [exh. cat.] ‘Dipinti di Rubens a Genova e per Genova’, in L’Età di Rubens. Dimore, committenti e collezionisti genovesi, ed. by P. Boccardo and A. Orlando, Milan 2004, p. 28, no. I.8. Fig. 2 Peter Paul Rubens, Veronica Spinola Serra, 3 A. Lercari and F. Gattiglia, ‘Alberi genealogici’, in canvas, 225.5 × 138.5 cm. Kunsthalle Karlsruhe, inv. 2505 La dama genovese … (as note 1), pp. 10–13.

4 Rubeniana

‘You are what you own’: an exceptional cupboard from 1626 for the Rubenshuis

The Rubenshuis has a small but varied The front of the cupboard is articulated collection of seventeenth-century by Ionic consoles (four on the upper furniture, including a number of top- section and three on the lower section) and notch pieces. In Rubens’s day, the art of generously decorated with lively carving furniture-making – and this holds true inspired by antique imagery: male and for the so-called ‘minor’ or applied arts female herms, lions’ heads, garlands of fruit in general – experienced a remarkable and floral motifs dominated by acanthus blossoming almost equal to that of the leaves. The panels in the doors are edged other arts: furniture, vessels of silver with a classical egg-and-dart moulding, an and gold, glassware and ceramics were ornament frequently seen on Greek and often made expressly as works of art Roman temples. An inconspicuous detail and considered as such. Their possession is the date, 1626, applied to a cartouche and display in the domestic interior was in the middle of the frieze. This makes the understood to convey the status and furniture even more special, since examples virtues of their owners. A very fine example of dated cupboards from the early of the high artistic quality of seventeenth- seventeenth century are rare. century furniture production in the Low A monumental storage cabinet of this Countries is the sumptuously executed kind, with a closed front and doors, was five-door cupboard buffet( à cinq portes) a comparatively new phenomenon at the that the museum was able to acquire beginning of the seventeenth century. In last year with the support of the Friends the Low Countries at this time, textiles and of the Rubenshuis. The cupboard, which other goods were usually stored in chests. was purchased at a special Sotheby’s sale Large cupboards such as this one served pattern of profiles, and the pronounced in London, comes from the collection of primarily to store linens (costly linen goods consoles point in any case to the influence Osterrieth House, once one of the most were the most important part of a woman’s of this city. splendid mansions of Antwerp a due passi trousseau) or precious tableware. The central upper door of the cupboard from Rubens’s house. Because so few pieces of well- is carved with the crest of the Saint The impressive piece of furniture documented furniture from the first half Sebastian Archers’ Guild (Schuttersgilde consists of a short upper section with of the seventeenth century are known, and Sint-Sebastiaan); on the three consoles of three doors, a lower section with two the figurative carving – almost certainly the lower section, angels carry the archers’ doors, and at the very bottom, two large done by a master wood-carver – was nearly spurs, crest and arrows. This cupboard was drawers – a common type known in later always anonymous, we can only guess presumably commissioned by a prominent times as a ‘five-door cupboard’. It is made at where and for whom this prestigious member of the Guild; in any case, its original completely of oak, which since the Middle cupboard was made. In all probability this owner must have been someone who Ages has been the type of wood preferred piece of furniture originated in Antwerp. believed that ‘you are what you own’. in northern Europe for fine furniture. The decoration of the doors, with a restless Ben van Beneden

The lamentable fate of a monument on Antwerp’s Meir

Visitors to the Rubenshuis can now admire in every one of the rococo windows. One an outstanding carved oak cabinet that wonders if the headaches caused by this once stood in nearby Osterrieth House, flashy presentation can be remedied by a stately home in Antwerp. the glasses on sale inside … This grand old mansion on the Meir We spare you the description of the is a gem of rococo architecture, built to entrance and the interior: bad taste and the design of Jan-Pieter van Baurscheit brisk business are much in evidence in (1699–1768) in 1746. Over the centuries this historic monument. this remarkable house has passed The City of Antwerp is doing its through various hands and has undergone utmost to value its monuments, numerous changes, but since 1939 its citizens taking great pride in the it has been listed as a cultural heritage recent restoration of the Handelsbeurs monument. (Stock Exchange) and the plans for a Today Osterrieth House is owned by new Rubens site. However, there are an investment company and that, sadly, no regulations stipulating the type of is all too obvious. The ground floor is advertising permissible in a monument. now occupied by Odette Lunettes, a hip What has been happening for the last eyewear brand that regales passersby with two years in Osterrieth House is nothing moving pictures in glaring colours, shown short of a disgrace. | Cécile Kruyfhooft

5 CORPUS RUBENIANUM LUDWIG BURCHARD

PATRON H S H Prince Hans-Adam II von und zu Liechtenstein Rubenianum Fund BOARD Thomas Leysen (Chairman) Dominique Allard, Arnout Balis, Michel Ceuterick, Gregory Martin, Ben van Beneden BENEFACTORS Fonds Baillet-Latour The Colnaghi Foundation Fonds Léon Courtin–Marcelle Bouché, managed by the King Baudouin Foundation The Klesch Collection Catherine Lewis Foundation / Schorr Collection The Samuel H. Kress Foundation The Michael Marks Charitable Trust vzw Natuurbehoud Pater David Broere Charitable Foundation The Hans K. Rausing Trust

Allaert-d’Hulst family Fiona Healy Patrick Maselis Arnout Balis Steven Heinz Otto Naumann Joris Brantegem Willem Jan and Karin Hoogsteder Natan Saban Annette Bühler Baroness Paul Janssen Cliff Schorer Michel Ceuterick David Koetser Léon Seynaeve Herman De Bode David Kowitz Vic and Lea Swerts Georges De Jonckheere Eric Le Jeune Daniel Thierry Eijk and Rose-Marie de Mol van Otterloo Bettina Leysen Michel Thoulouze Dr Willem Dreesmann Thomas and Nancy Leysen Johnny Van Haeften Antoine Friling Stichting Liedts-Meessen Eric Verbeeck Bob Haboldt Pierre Macharis Juan Miguel Villar Mir Gaëtan and Bénédicte Hannecart Matthew & Susan Weatherbie Jules-André Hayen Mark Weiss DONORS Fergus and Olivia Hall Patricia Annicq Stéphane Holvoet Baron Jean-Albert Moorkens Ingrid Ceusters Nicolas Horsch & Arne Huebscher Philip Mould Manny and Brigitta Davidson Christophe Janet Jan Muller Jean-Marie De Coster Baron Daniel Janssen Klaas Muller Baron Bernard de Giey Baron Paul-Emmanuel Janssen Simon and Elena Mumford Koen De Groeve Jean-Louis and Martine Juliard-Reynaers Marnix Neerman Joseph de Gruyter Gijs Keij Paulson Family Foundation Philip de Haseth-Möller Cécile Kruyfhooft Joseph and Jana Roussel Ann Dejonckheere Christian Levett Eric Speeckaert Jan De Maere Christian and Brigitte Leysen Eric Turquin Michel Demoortel Sabina Leysen Rafael Valls Elisabeth de Rothschild Anne Leysen-Ahlers Lieve Vandeputte Bernard Descheemaeker Sergey Litvin Philippe Van de Vyvere François de Visscher Anne-Marie Logan Guido Vanherpe Eric Dorhout Mees Elizabeth McGrath Jeannot Van Hool Count Ghislain d’Ursel Gregory Martin Tijo and Christine van Marle Jacqueline Gillion Filip Moerman Rijnhard and Elsbeth van Tets Alice Goldet Axel Vervoordt Dov Gottesman Morris Zukerman CORPORATE BENEFACTORS Crop’s nv Thomas Agnew’s & Co. Dorotheum Matthiesen Ltd BASF Antwerpen nv Groupe Bruxelles Lambert sa Noortman Master Paintings Belfius Bank KBC Group nv Rosy Blue nv Bernaerts nv Koller Auctions Ltd Sibelco – SCR nv Biront nv Lazard Frères Sotheby’s Christie’s Lhoist sa Telenet nv

and a number of benefactors and donors who wish to remain anonymous

V.U.: Thomas Leysen CENTRUM RUBENIANUM With thanks to Anagram, Ghent