2007 Catalogue - Colnaghi

The younger of the two sons, in a garment copying the
style of the lorica worn by Roman soldiers, presents his
kill in the form of a hare held by its hind legs, 6 as a
little spaniel jumps around near him. On the right of
the picture, the pose of one of the two daughters, who
has also similarly slipped into a mythological role,
corresponds to that of her two brothers, turned
inwards towards the picture plane. The shell with
which she draws water from the Renaissance fountain
is a motif familiar from the imagery of Granida and
Daifilo, one of the pastoral literary works by P.C.
Hooft, popular at that time and frequently seized upon
by history- as well as portrait-painters. 7 Water as a
symbol of purity in conjunction with the motif of
Cupid surmounting the fountain, raising its arms to
Heaven as if wishing to flee all earthly things, gave the
contemporary viewer a clear understanding of the
morally sound nature of this allegory of Love. The
second daughter, obviously a little younger, wears a
dress and hairstyle in the fashion of the day. Her
smooth, parted hairstyle appears in works by Dutch
portraitists from 1668. 8 The oranges in her left hand
signified marital concepts such as love, chastity and
fertility. 9
The parents seated at the base of the fountain gaze out
towards the viewer (as do two of their children)
creating a source of tranquility in the lively
‘choreography’ of the figures. With the father’s right
hand, so to speak, he introduces his family to the
viewer with pride, while at the same time linking arms
with his wife in wedded bliss. The latter is depicted
wearing a wine-coloured dress over a white silk
underskirt, pearls at her throat, ears and in her hair,
with a bonnet and veil. Arnold Houbroken, the
Netherlandish writer of biographies on artists, draws
attention to Maes’s ‘flattering brush’ (vleijend penceel)
and tells many an interesting anecdote in this respect
about particularly vain female clients. 10
The obvious blend of elements from contemporary
fashion and mythological costume is on the whole
typical of the Dutch historicising portraits of the
second half of the seventeenth century. That having
been said, probably no other portraitist has been as
bold in his accessorising as Maes or, to be more exact,
the Maes of the years from 1670 onwards. The crossover
of motifs from the world of huntsman and
shepherd has also been widespread. 11 It is interesting
that even the neoclassical painter and theoretician
Gerard de Lairesse recommended a coexistence of the
Antique and the Modern. 12
The Colnaghi painting is neither signed nor dated but
stylistic grounds allow the date to be set within the
years circa 1675/76. The reasons for this are the
brightly gleaming colours and the fluidity of the
brushstrokes of hair and dress that are characteristic of
Maes’s brushwork during these two years, the most
successful of his career. 13 As, by a very conservative
estimate, of the 900 portraits painted by Maes in
28
roughly four decades, over 250 with dates survive, his
stylistic development can be plotted with exactitude,
a rare occurrence with seventeenth century artists. 14
After his apprenticeship with Rembrandt in
Amsterdam was completed, Maes returned to his
birthplace, Dordrecht, opened his own studio and
started a family. In the initial years of independence he
painted mainly interiors with mothers, children and
eavesdropping maidservants, but also turned very early
(1655) to the portrait, devoting himself entirely to this
art from 1660. Following the death of Jacob Cuyp,
Maes immediately became the leading portraitist in
Dordrecht, receiving in addition more and more
commissions from outside it during the 1660s. In the
year 1673 Maes and his family settled in Amsterdam
where he enjoyed overwhelming success. Even though
his production rate slowed as he became older, he yet
remained unchallenged as No.1 until circa 1680. No
fewer than thirty-two dated portraits survive from the
year 1675 alone. At the time Maes was painting an
estimated one to two portraits a week for patrons
belonging to the wealthy bourgeoisie: burgomasters,
merchants, senior officials and clergymen. Amazingly,
the quality of Maes’ work was not at all affected by the
large increase in output, quite the opposite. In the
very few years of greatest output circa 1675-1680 and
without the help of assistants, the most surprising, upto-date
painterly solutions were worked out.
Maes at any rate reacted to the strong demand by
painting an increasing number of small-format halflength
portraits, often without hands, since these took
up less time. Consequently the group portrait we have
here must have been the result of an exceptional
commission, particularly as the painting of family
portraits was not the type of work favoured by
successful portraitists. The fact is that the majority of
Dutch family portraits are by lesser-known or even
unknown artists. 15 In a similar manner Maes too
painted the portraits of far more families at the
beginning of his career than he did in later years. From
these years in Amsterdam only one other family
portrait is known. This is in the Fogg Art Museum,
Cambridge, Massachussetts and can be dated to the
later years of the 1680s. 16
Unfortunately the identity of the sitters remains
elusive. There is no painted coat-of-arms, no dusty
monogram, nothing that could help us further.
Following a suggestion by Susan Morris that perhaps
the prominently displayed hare might provide proof of
the family name, investigations took place in the
Bureau of Iconography in The Hague and in the
Municipal Archive in Amsterdam. They failed to yield
a positive result, the only suitable candidate, Anthonij
de Haes, having died without issue. 17
Report by Dr Léon Krempel, Curator, Haus der Kunst,
Munich, and author of Studien zu den datierten Gemälden
des Nicolaes Maes (1634-1693), Petersberg 2000.