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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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Maen Colman Stone Country: Wales Topic: Neolithic and Bronze Age
A large irregular boulder of dolerite standing on the west side of the lane leading to Glanpwlldu, some 180m south of St Colman's Church, Pembrokeshire.
It is carved with crosses of various styles on three faces. http://www.megalithic.co.uk/article.php?sid=7044 |
They usually claim carvings are diagnostic of the age they were carved. Out in the wet, windy conditions of Wales especially. Perhaps the fourth side was facing west and the cross didn't survive.
This is the first time I have heard about crosses from the Neolithic and Bronze Ages, we may have to revise our Christian chronology once again. But more importantly they are tacitly conceding that all sorts of people carve all sorts of crosses on all sorts of things in all sorts of eras. A major breakthrough. Find out the dates for Kilroy, Samantha, father and son.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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I was naturally drawn irresistibly to this
and when I discovered it was one of our favourites, an Elder/Younger style situation
| Exploring the meaning of “The Hunters in the Snow†by Pieter Bruegel the Elder Christopher P Jones |
I thought I might give it a quick whirl. When I couldn't find much of a provenance beyond
| Nicolaas Jongelinck; 1594 gift of the city of Antwerp to Archduke Ernst; 1595 estate of Archduke Ernst; Rudolf II; Coll. Leopold Wilhelm |
I decided I was in business. But this being one of the most famous paintings in the history of Art History, I thought I'd better canvas ("He's on form today") more opinions before screaming 'It's a fake' on medium.com. So get to it!
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Hatty
Site Admin
In: Berkshire
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| Mick Harper wrote: | | Nicolaas Jongelinck; 1594 gift of the city of Antwerp to Archduke Ernst; 1595 estate of Archduke Ernst; Rudolf II; Coll. Leopold Wilhelm |
Wiki has quite a detailed entry for Jonghelinck
| Nicolaes Jonghelinck (1517–1570) was a merchant banker and art collector from Antwerp. He is best known for his collection of paintings by Pieter Bruegel the Elder and Frans Floris. His brother was the sculptor Jacques Jonghelinck. |
So far he sounds kosher but the paintings were never catalogued and the Jonghelinck mansion was destroyed in the Sack of Antwerp in 1576.. The Kunsthistorisches Museum where the painting is displayed was officially opened in 1891. .
| Though it is known that Jonghelinck owned 16 paintings by Bruegel at the time of his death, the specific list is unknown and for many years art historians assumed that this cycle of paintings included either four panels for the four seasons or twelve panels for all twelve months. Now it is assumed they represent six bi-monthly pairs, with one missing. They are assumed to be a continuation of an older tradition to make cyclical images of the Labours of the Months, but they were hung by Jonghelinck in his chateau and therefore may simply have been ordered as wall decorations. |
The missing painting is 'High Spring'.
The last owner listed in the museum record, Archduke Leopold Wilhelm of Austria (1614-1662), was the Governor of the Spanish Netherlands and a 'voracious collector' if the National Trust Collections is to be believed...."The Archduke owned 517 Italian High Renaissance pictures, many of which were acquired from the English royal collection after the execution of Charles I in 1649".
Leopold's court painter was David Teniers (the Younger!), appointed in 1651, and in effect the curator of the archduke's gallery in the Coudenberg Palace in the Royal Quarter of Brussels. Nothing out of the ordinary except perhaps
| he [Teniers] painted the first three of his eleven imaginary depictions of the gallery. |
The royal palace of Coudenberg had been taken over and extensively restored in the 17th century by Archdukes Albert VII and Isabella who commissioned paintings from the leading artists of the day, Rubens and Jan Brueghel the Younger aka Jan Brueghel II of Antwerp, who were close friends and collaborators. (Jan the Elder's dad was known as Pieter Bruegel the Elder so somewhere along the line an aitch was added.)
The National Trust Collections notes that many of the pictures in Teniers' paintings of Leopold's gallery 'are identifiable today' but doesn't mention a specific Bruegel (the Elder) picture, never mind 'The Hunters in the Snow'.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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That's enough for me to scream fake.
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Hatty
Site Admin
In: Berkshire
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Teniers the Younger did more than merely curate paintings. He went on to produce a printed catalogue of the Archduke's collections. Or rather, a catalogue of his own paintings of the 'imaginary gallery' consisting of
| 229 engraved reproductions (244 in the expanded second edition of 1660) of the small painted copies that Teniers had made from the original works. |
He could be called, as his Wiki entry suggests, a Renaissance man
| David Teniers the Younger or David Teniers II was a Flemish Baroque painter, printmaker, draughtsman, miniaturist painter, staffage painter, copyist and art curator. He was an extremely versatile artist known for his prolific output.[1] He was an innovator in a wide range of genres such as history painting, genre painting, landscape painting, portrait and still life. He is now best remembered as the leading Flemish genre painter of his day. |
He would go on to found the Antwerp Academy, now the Royal Academy of Fine Arts Antwerp, in 1663, where young artists were taught to carry on the glory years of Rubens and van Dyck. David seems to have been particularly suited for the position, coming from a family where everyone including his three virtually unknown brothers painted for a living
| A collaborator of his father early on in his career, the father and son pair created together a series of twelve panels recounting stories from Torquato Tasso's epic Gerusalemme Liberata (Museo del Prado, Madrid). His father was frequently in financial straits and his debts landed him occasionally in jail. David the younger had to make copies of old masters in order to support the family. |
A close Brueghel connection was formed
| Teniers married into the famous Brueghel artist family when Anna Brueghel, daughter of Jan Brueghel the Elder, became his wife on 22 July 1637. Rubens, who had been the guardian of Anna Brueghel after her father's death, was a witness at the wedding. Through his marriage Teniers was able to cement a close relationship with Rubens who had been a good friend and frequent collaborator with his wife's father. |
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Teniers_the_Younger
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Hatty
Site Admin
In: Berkshire
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The Teniers 'catalogue' is, aptly in my view, a Pictorial Theatre
The genre of picture-gallery paintings was well established in Flanders by the time that Teniers came to paint his. The significant innovation of Teniers was - no doubt at the behest of his employer - to include representations of an actual collection of pictures, a kind of pictorial inventory of a significant part of the collection, and thus a precursor of the graphic inventory that Teniers did go on to make, by painting small reductions on panel of each of the Archduke’s paintings, which were then engraved to form a visual compendium in the Theatrum Pictorium, whose first edition was published (after the departure of the Archduke for Austria) at his own expense in 1660.
Even more singular is the fact that the three representations of 1651 are exclusively of pictures painted in Italy, mostly Venetian, and from the collection formed in Venice by Bartolomeo della Nave, which had been acquired by Lord Fielding, the English ambassador in Venice, for Charles I on the instructions of the 1st Duke of Hamilton, but had remained on the latter’s hands when they arrived in England in 1639, because of Charles I’s inability to pay for them. After Hamilton’s execution in 1649 they were sold in 1651, and it is probable that Teniers was the agent sent by the Archduke to England to purchase them. |
https://www.nationaltrustcollections.org.uk/object/486159
The illustrious Courtauld Institute lauds the Teniers catalogue as 'a valuable historical resource', an all too familiar refrain in academic pronouncements. What they choose to ignore is the Teniers paintings of the gallery collections are (largely) fictitious.
Having first documented Leopold Wilhelm’s collection in these gallery pictures, Teniers embarked on an even more ambitious representation of his patron’s achievements as a collector: an illustrated catalogue of 243 of the Archduke’s most admired Italian paintings. This would become the Theatrum Pictorium. Like the gallery interiors, the selection was made up almost entirely of works acquired from the Hamilton collection and many of the same paintings appear in both the Theatrum and the gallery views.
However, the Theatrum Pictorium was designed to reach a far greater audience than the international courtly circle of the gallery interiors and its presentation of Leopold Wilhelm’s collection is more systematic. Teniers employed a team of 12 engravers for the unprecedented task of reproducing the 243 paintings selected for inclusion in the Theatrum. Remarkably, he produced small copies in oil of each of the chosen paintings, issuing these as models to his engravers in order to ensure the accuracy of their work. |
Teniers was completely in control of every aspect of the reproduction operation. The fidelity of the copies though not always easy to judge seems to have never been doubted
| Teniers’ painted copies have long been recognised as a valuable historical resource, particularly since many pictures in the Archduke’s collection, including most famously Giorgione’s The Three Philosophers, were altered during a reinstallation of the Viennese collections in the 18th century, while others have been lost altogether. |
https://courtauld.ac.uk/gallery/exhibitions/past-exhibitions/david-teniers-and-the-theatre-of-painting/
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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This is priceless. The key of course is The Sack of Antwerp. Once you have a known repository of artworks that has gone missing you have a ready made provenance for artworks. However... the really big thing is
| Teniers married into the famous Brueghel artist family when Anna Brueghel, daughter of Jan Brueghel the Elder, became his wife on 22 July 1637. |
The coincidence is an absurdity. It leads one to suppose:
* Either this is made up to account for Teniers having Brueghel paintings about his person (but which doesn't account for how he got them from Jonghelinck's sacked mansion) or
* Breughel, father and son, are themselves made up characters who were, it was claimed, famous painters collected by Jonghelinck or
* This whole thing is fabricated much later, with all the "Teniers was able to cement a close relationship with Rubens" as added colour.
It would be nice to get rid of Breughel(s) totally, whose paintings I have always thought of as more L. S. Lowry than T H E Renaissance. A timeline would be useful.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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Your second piece slipped in above mine without me noticing. It opens a quite sensational new front in the epic battle against New Masters for Old. I'll pick it apart in noxious detail
| The Teniers 'catalogue' is, aptly in my view, a Pictorial Theatre |
Was this term as new to you as it was to me? Do we know of any other examples of it? Teniers is not to be confused with Tenniel, the illustrator of Alice in Wonderland.
| The genre of picture-gallery paintings was well established in Flanders by the time that Teniers came to paint his. |
I don't understand this. Do they mean paintings painted specifically for galleries rather than for individuals or corporations? And how are they different, apart from portraiture or similar specialised commissions?
| The significant innovation of Teniers was - no doubt at the behest of his employer |
Who is his employer? The gallery?
| to include representations of an actual collection of pictures |
In what sense is 'a representation' not a copy? Presumably a verbal description was not enough. A quick cartoon outline of the main features of each picture was not enough..
| a kind of pictorial inventory of a significant part of the collection |
I am completely bewildered. If it's supposed to be a catalogue or maybe an official record then what's the point of only 'a significant part'? I can understand "Here's some of the better pics you can see at the gallery" or "Here's what they've got at the gallery" but "Here's most of them, I left out others for no particular reason" is pretty odd.
What, he invented two whole new art innovations?
| of the graphic inventory that Teniers did go on to make, by painting small reductions on panel of each of the Archduke’s paintings |
Well, a significant part of them anyway.
| which were then engraved to form a visual compendium |
I think we're on to our third art innovation. What happened to the panel paintings and why didn't the engraver just work from the originals if it was so important?
| in the Theatrum Pictorium, whose first edition was published (after the departure of the Archduke for Austria) at his own expense in 1660. |
"Dear Archduke, would you mind if I made bijou copies of your entire collection in case you're called back to Vienna [it seems to have been 1656 rather than 1660] for some reason. Entirely at my own expense, you understand, yours faithfully, Teniers, D (the younger).
No, I'll have to go for a lie-down, this is all too much.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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But before I go I suppose I ought to point out this is a perfect example of what later fakers did: create false catalogues and bibliographies containing references to and thereby provenances for the gear they are knocking up in the garden shed. Works every time.
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Hatty
Site Admin
In: Berkshire
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| Mick Harper wrote: | | this is a perfect example of what later fakers did: create false catalogues and bibliographies containing references to and thereby provenances for the gear they are knocking up in the garden shed. |
That was also my conclusion.
No-one knows if 'High Spring', the missing painting from Breugel's Months of the Year series, ever existed or, if it did, who painted it, judging by Wiki's comment
| Spring, 1565, a drawing made to be engraved. It was apparently never painted by Bruegel himself, but after his death came dozens of versions in paint by his son and others. |
A drawing 'made to be engraved'? We keep being told the paintings were commissioned by Niclaes Jonghelinck to be hung on the walls of his house
| the Jonghelinck mansion was destroyed in the Sack of Antwerp in 1576 |
Well, no-one has been able to pinpoint the exact location of Jonghelinck's house, not for want of looking
| The Antwerp team reported that Plomteux, Prims and Vande Weghe stated that the site where the villa owned by Niclaes Jongelinck once stood can be located between the current streets Hof Ter Bekestraat, Broederminstraat, Lange Elzenstraat and Oudekerkstraat. The Antwerp team agrees with this conclusion and indicate that on the maps of 1617 and 1624 the Jonckelinck villa is clearly shown on the south side of the present day Markgravelei while the other possible location (cf. Rutger Tijs) is clearly indicated on the north side. |
So the house hadn't been destroyed in the Sack of Antwerp as it's still shown on maps forty years later. Turns out the building was probably demolished during industrial development of the area from 1872 onwards
| Niclaes Jongelinck’s villa (indicated on maps in 1617 and 1624 but not on the map from 1698) or at least a building which it replaced is drawn on the 1802 and 1814 cadastral drawings. On the 1836 drawing it is not present. The Antwerp team assumes that it was demolished somewhere between 1814 and 1836. When the Antwerp team tried to project the 1814 drawing on a geographical information system present day map, it seems that the buildings location is under or in the neighborhood of the present day building Coebergerstraat 35-37. The team indicates that the precision of this location is as good as the precision of the 1814 map and the number of comparison points they found. |
https://bruegelnow.com/2016/03/01/searching-for-niclaes-jongelincks-house/
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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Dear Christ, it's so bad I'm having difficulty catching up.
| The illustrious Courtauld Institute lauds the Teniers catalogue as 'a valuable historical resource', an all too familiar refrain in academic pronouncements. What they choose to ignore is the Teniers paintings of the gallery collections are (largely) fictitious. |
It's gone all to pot since Anthony Blunt took early retirement. I don't think 'chose to ignore' exactly sums up their overall attitude though.
| Having first documented Leopold Wilhelm’s collection in these gallery pictures, Teniers embarked on an even more ambitious representation of his patron’s achievements as a collector: an illustrated catalogue of 243 of the Archduke’s most admired Italian paintings. This would become the Theatrum Pictorium. Like the gallery interiors, the selection was made up almost entirely of works acquired from the Hamilton collection and many of the same paintings appear in both the Theatrum and the gallery views. |
Where then does Breughel fit in? "Are you going to include some of my brother's stuff or what?" said Mrs Teniers, smacking her rolling pin in the palm of her hand.
| However, the Theatrum Pictorium was designed to reach a far greater audience than the international courtly circle of the gallery interiors and its presentation of Leopold Wilhelm’s collection is more systematic. Teniers employed a team of 12 engravers for the unprecedented task of reproducing the 243 paintings selected for inclusion in the Theatrum. Remarkably, he produced small copies in oil of each of the chosen paintings, issuing these as models to his engravers in order to ensure the accuracy of their work. |
Ah well, now we've reached terra firma. The fakes factory. That's what made me inclined to think it was all later but now I'm not so sure.
Teniers was completely in control of every aspect of the reproduction operation. The fidelity of the copies though not always easy to judge seems to have never been doubted
Teniers’ painted copies have long been recognised as a valuable historical resource, particularly since many pictures in the Archduke’s collection, including most famously Giorgione’s The Three Philosophers, were altered during a reinstallation of the Viennese collections in the 18th century, while others have been lost altogether. |
Terra firma indeed.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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No-one knows if 'High Spring', the missing painting from Breugel's Months of the Year series, ever existed or, if it did, who painted it, judging by Wiki's comment
Spring, 1565, a drawing made to be engraved. It was apparently never painted by Bruegel himself, but after his death came dozens of versions in paint by his son and others. |
I'm getting confused by which Breugel, whose son and who are the others. Timeline, timeline, timeline.
| A drawing 'made to be engraved'? We keep being told the paintings were commissioned by Niclaes Jonghelinck to be hung on the walls of his house |
I think we can safely eliminate this gentleman from the proceedings though presumably he was a well known art connoisseur, upon whom anything can be foisted. A one-man Alexandrian Library.
the Jonghelinck mansion was destroyed in the Sack of Antwerp in 1576
Well, no-one has been able to pinpoint the exact location of Jonghelinck's house, not for want of looking |
Again, he probably had a large house with pictures in it. Every Antwerp mansion-owner did at the time. Genre Dutch stuff, the latest Italianate imports.
| The Antwerp team reported that Plomteux, Prims and Vande Weghe stated that the site where the villa owned by Niclaes Jongelinck once stood can be located between the current streets Hof Ter Bekestraat, Broederminstraat, Lange Elzenstraat and Oudekerkstraat. The Antwerp team agrees with this conclusion and indicate that on the maps of 1617 and 1624 the Jonckelinck villa is clearly shown on the south side of the present day Markgravelei while the other possible location (cf. Rutger Tijs) is clearly indicated on the north side. |
This is so typical. Everybody beavering away writing papers on something inessential while the important stuff has long disappeared over the horizon.
| So the house hadn't been destroyed in the Sack of Antwerp |
Well, technically, nobody is claiming it was. The inference that it was looted of its art (or the art was nobly spirited away) is enough.
| as it's still shown on maps forty years later. Turns out the building was probably demolished during industrial development of the area from 1872 onwards |
If a genuine sixteenth century mansion was still extant after everything Antwerp has been through since, it would undoubtedly have been turned into an art gallery by now. Somebody should write a book about all this.
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Wile E. Coyote
In: Arizona
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I hadn't been following this, so was doing a bit of browsing and came across the following. It won't help you lot, but for Wiley (who knows a bit about coins, but not paintings) and maybe a few others these bits of technical knowledge do help......So I will slip it in before you carry on.
Where the name, David Teniers the Younger (1610 - 1690) is given with the first name/s and surname of the artist, usually cited as, David Teniers the Younger including the dates to be specific, then in their qualified and professional opinion, they are in no doubt, it is a genuine and authentic item and one painted by that specific artist. This is usually fully qualified by its inclusion in any catalogue raissone, or by the guarantee of the opinion given by appropriate and internationally recognized expert authority on that artist.
When David Teniers the Younger (1610 - 1690) is the term used, or it is similarly defined as Attrib. to ' [abbreviated,] or Attribue, or Atribudo, or ascribed to, then in their opinion it is 'probably' a work by the artist, at least in part. But... there is no guarantee. It is only an opinion that it 'possibly' may be by the artist.
But if the term David Teniers the Younger (1610 - 1690) - circle of, entourage, or “Circle of †David Teniers the Younger is specifically used, then in their opinion, it is a work only of the period of the artist, but showing their influence. Or by someone closely associated with the artist, BUT not necessarily by their pupil, assistant or student.
When the name is given thus; Painted in the “Style of or “Follower of David Teniers the Younger (1610 - 1690) is used, this means that in their opinion it is a work of art executed only in the artist’s way, in their 'style', but not necessarily by a pupil. Yet it may be a contemporary, or nearly a contemporary of the artist.
If the phrase in the “Manner of David Teniers the Younger is used or is defined….†then in their opinion it is also only a work painted in the style of the artist, but of a later date and definitely not by the artist as named.
When the term “After…. "; is the term used, then in their opinion it is a copy (made at any date) of an authentic and original work by the artist. This also applies to prints made 'after' an original work of art either by the artist or another artist/ printmaker.
Signed - David Teniers the Younger ; “Dated….†or “Inscribed †Then in their opinion the work has been signed/dated/or inscribed by that specific artist. The addition of a question mark ? however, indicates a strong element of doubt.
When the term 'Bears signature', is used or the name, David Teniers the Younger is specified followed by the words; "With signature ….â€, or “With date ….†or “With ......inscription….†or “Bears signature of David Teniers the Younger . / date / or inscription†Then in 'their opinion,' either the signature / date / or inscription is spurious, forged or has been added by someone else other than the artist. | |
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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So when it says
| Churned out by Teniers Inc |
what does that signify? Not forgetting
| Churned out by anyone who came across Teniers in an art history book and thought, "By 'eckaslike, he'll do." | |
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Hatty
Site Admin
In: Berkshire
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| Mick Harper wrote: | | Your Trogus the Bogus (good one!) will have to get the treatment (though I am not volunteering myself for the task). |
Pompeius Trogus is accredited with authorship of the history of Alexander the Great and the Macedonian Empire. though it appears only one work, Epitome historiarum Trogi Pompeii, has survived
| His principal work, however, was his 44-volume Philippic Histories and the Origin of the Whole World and the Places of the Earth (Historiae Philippicae et Totius Mundi Origines et Terrae Situs), now lost, which, according to its surviving epitome, had as its principal theme the Macedonian Empire founded by Philip II but functioned as a general history of all of the parts of the world which fell under the control of Alexander the Great and his successors, with extensive ethnographical and geographical digressions. |
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnaeus_Pompeius_Trogus
It turns out that no work written by Trogus has survived. In fact the only reason his name comes up is because someone called Justin wrote an 'Epitome' citing Trogus as his (lost) source
| The Epitome of the Philippic History of Pompeius Trogus (Latin Epitoma Historiarum Philippicarum Pompei Trogi) by the second-century Roman writer Justin is an abridgment of the Augustan historian Pompeius Trogus' lengthy work the Historiae Philippicae, which has not survived. Justin's epitome is the only surviving source for Trogus' original work. |
As with Trogus, 'Justin' is absent from the historical record
Justin's name is given only in manuscripts of his own history, the majority of which simply identify him as Justinus. One manuscript identifies him as Justinus Frontinus, the other as Marcus Junianus Justinus. The accuracy of these names is uncertain.
With virtually nothing known about the author the origin of the work is much disputed. It is believed to have been written in Rome due to a section in the preface where Justin writes that he had composed the work "during the leisure that I enjoyed in the city". |
Scholars seem to have found it hard to tell the two absentees apart
The composition of the work is complicated due to its epitomized nature, with some elements coming from Trogus and the rest from Justin, and determining whom a particular element belongs to is difficult due to the loss of the principal.
This complexity leads to issues when determining who influenced the work of Justin, as it can often be difficult to tell whether connections between the Epitome and earlier works are due to Justin being influenced by those works, or by those works being influenced by Trogus. |
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epitome_of_the_Philippic_History_of_Pompeius_Trogus
Justin's 'Epitome' was first published in 1470 in Venice. "It was a very popular text, particularly in the Renaissance." There are 164 manuscripts, all 'humanistic' and all written in Italy during the fifteenth and early sixteenth century.
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