Lot 30: ADRIAEN HANNEMAN THE HAGUE CIRCA 1601-1671

PROPERTY FROM A PRIVATE COLLECTION

PORTRAIT OF A LADY, THREE-QUARTER LENGTH, WEARING PEARLS AND AN ORANGE DRESS

measurements note
111.8 by 96 cm.; 44 by 37 3/4 in.

signed and dated lower right: An^o. 1657/ Adr: Hanneman./ F.

oil on canvas

PROVENANCE

The Hanoverian Royal Collections;
In the possession of the present owner's family for nearly a century.

LITERATURE

O. Eisenmann, Katalog der zum Ressort der Königlichen Verwaltngs-Kommission gehörigen Sammlung von Gemälden, Skulpturen und Alterthümen im Provinzial-Museumsgebaude..Hannover, Hanover 1891, p. 114, no. 176;
J. Reimers, Katalog der zur Fideikommiss-Galerie des Gesamthauses Braunschweig und Lüneburg gehörigen Sammlung von Gemälden und Skulpturen im Provinzialmuseum Rudolf v. Benningstr. 1 zu Hannover, Hanover 1905, no. 139.

NOTE

This portrait was painted in The Hague, where Hanneman had settled in 1640. Before this he had spent over a decade in London, where he had in all probability worked in the studio of Sir Anthony van Dyck, whose elegant style was to remain the dominant influence on Hanneman's career. By the time this portrait was painted in 1657, Hanneman enjoyed a considerable reputation as an independent portraitist. Many of his patrons were English, drawn from the ranks of the royalist exiles who spent time in The Hague after the Civil War, and included the young Charles II, then Prince of Wales, as well as his brother Henry, Duke of Gloucester (1653, Washington, National Gallery). He also numbered increasingly important Dutch patrons among his sitters, including the young William of Orange (1654, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam) and his mother Maria Henrietta Stuart (1659, Edinburgh).

Despite her evident beauty, the identity of the sitter in this portrait is not recorded. Given the painting's distinguished provenance from the Hanoverian royal collections, it is more than possible that the sitter was drawn from the family or circle of Elizabeth Stuart, the `Winter Queen' of Bohemia (1596-1662) and her son Charles Louis, the Elector Palatine (1617-1680) during their long residence in The Hague. Hanneman had already painted the Elector's sister Louise Hollandine two years earlier in 1655 (formerly Hanover, Schloss Marienburg, reproduced in O.ter Kuile, Adriaen Hanneman, Amsterdam 1976, p. 85, no. 31, fig. 79) and would paint their sister Sophie, later the Electress of Hanover (1630-1714) twice around 1660-61 (formerly Hanover, Haus Calenberg, reproduced Ter Kuile, op. cit., figs. 16 and 70). In these as in the present portrait Hanneman displays an elegance and refinement that mark him as perhaps the finest of all Van Dyck's followers. This portrait most probably formed part of the Hanoverian Royal collections since the seventeenth century, remaining there until early in the last century.