RKD STUDIES

Many Dutch artists of Van Hoogstraten’s time travelled to Italy to study the art and architecture that could only be found there and incorporated what they learned into their work. Curiously, we see scant evidence of this in the drawings and paintings Van Hoogstraten made after his return to Dordrecht in 1656. One possible exception is a canvas depicting Christ crowned with thorns in Munich, dated 1657 [25]. Strikingly, it is close in theme to one of the three paintings he presented to the emperor in August 1651.¹ However, it very clearly bears a date of 1657, embellished with an illusionistic twig running through it, reflecting the artist’s very distinctive penchant for visual tricks. While the painting shows some connection to an earlier print by Dirck van Hoogstraten – which likewise includes a hatted tormentor to the right – it diverges strongly in the figure’s elegantly twisting pose with the raised knee. There is also no connection to the informal and relaxed poses Samuel van Hoogstraten had studied in drawing sessions with Rembrandt.² Instead, Christ’s pose appears to reflect Van Hoogstraten’s study of the rightmost figure of the famous sculpture of Laocoön, in Rome, where a suffering figure likewise bends forward and lifts his knee in response to the torment from behind.

Another Italian aspect of this painting is the bulky, monumental presentation of the figure of Christ. Combined with a muted palette and strong chiaroscuro, it relates in turn to the work of the Venetian tenebrosi (such as Giovanni Battista Langetti (c. 1635-1676)), who combined elements of the Neapolitan Caravaggism of Jusepe de Ribera (1591-1652) and followers, with aspects derived from Peter Paul Rubens (1577-1640).³ Van Hoogstraten’s former pupil Willem Drost (1633-1659) would arrive in Venice only a few years later, and adopt this mode wholesale.⁴ Even so, Van Hoogstraten did not imitate the rough facture of the tenebrosi, but maintained his own penchant for smoothly rounded forms and surfaces. A largely similar style characterizes his depiction of Heraclitus [26], which can also be dated shortly after his return from Italy. The same applies to the more recently rediscovered canvas of the Virgin with child [29], likely from a little later, around 1660. Van Hoogstraten went on to apply a more imposing figure scale in his portraits from this period as well, as can be seen in his Portrait of an unknown man of 1660, and in the 1661 portraits of the Dordrecht wine merchant Jacob Ouzeel [27] and his wife Maaiken Stoop [28].

25
Samuel van Hoogstraten
Christ crowned with thorns, dated 1657
Munich, Bayerische Staatsgemäldesammlungen, inv./cat.nr. 1232

26
Samuel van Hoogstraten
The Greek philosopher Heraclitus of Ephesus (c. 535-c 475), 1650-1655
Koblenz, Mittelrhein-Museum, inv./cat.nr. MRM M 12

27
Samuel van Hoogstraten
Portrait of Jacob Ouzeel (1601-1666), dated 1661
Dordrecht, Dordrechts Museum, inv./cat.nr. DM/936/513

28
Samuel van Hoogstraten
Portrait of Maaiken Stoop (1631-1709), 1661
Dordrecht, Dordrechts Museum, inv./cat.nr. DM/936/514

There is one other echo of Van Hoogstraten’s Italian sojourn, in a rare allegorical painting representing an allegory on time and eternity, now in the Kremer Collection [30]. Long assumed to date late from his career, the 1670s, it can be placed instead in the late 1650s, as a more direct response to Van Hoogstraten’s experiences in Venice and Rome, to judge by the vigorous brushwork and robust and dynamic presentation of the male figure, also evident in the Christ crowned with thorns [25]. The colour combination of muted reds and greens in turn echoes that of the Virgin with child, again pointing to a date around 1658/1660. The prominent sarcophagus-like frieze of bubble-blowing putti, however, reflects the work of Flemish sculptors that Van Hoogstraten could have seen in Amsterdam, in particular that of Francois du Quesnoy (1597-1643), also conjured in paint by other Rembrandt pupils, especially Gerard Dou (1613-1675).⁵

At the same time, there also remains a possibility of Van Hoogstraten’s former teacher Rembrandt’s influence in these paintings. The large scale and enhanced focus on the main figure, most evident in the Christ crowned with thorns, echo the turn in Rembrandt’s late style, which developed after Van Hoogstraten left for travel in 1651, see for example the Half-length figure of an old man in fantasy costume of that year [31]. There is considerable evidence that Van Hoogstraten’s pupils Nicolaes Maes (1634-1693) and Abraham van Dijck (c. 1635-1680) visited Rembrandt around 1656. Van Dijck made a drawn copy of an interim state of Rembrandt’s Apostle Paul in Washington, and experimented with open brush work in a number of paintings around this time.⁶ In turn, Maes’s Apostle Thomas in Kassel imitates the brushwork in Rembrandt’s Jacob blessing Manasseh and Ephraim of 1656 in the same collection. For Van Hoogstraten, we also have a concrete reference to his study of a painting that could have been in the process of being painted in Rembrandt’s studio around 1657, in his drawing after Rembrandt’s Jupiter and Mercury visiting Philemon and Baucis in Washington, dated to around 1658, making this scenario quite tangible.

30
Samuel van Hoogstraten
Allegory on time and eternity, c. 1670-1675
United States of America, Netherlands, Spain, private collection The Kremer Collection

31
Rembrandt or studio of Rembrandt
Half-length figure of an old man in fantasy costume, dated 1651
Private collection, inv./cat.nr. 550