Lot 52: Gerrit Claesz. Bleker (1610-1656)

The Meeting of Jacob and Laban indistinctly signed (strengthened) and dated (strengthened?) G Bleker 1642 (GB linked) centre below oil on panel 64.8 x 60.3 cm PROVENANCE with J. Leger & Son, London. LITERATURE H. Schneider, "Een schilderij van P. Rottermondt", Mededelingen van den Dienst voor Kunsten en wetenschappen, III, 1933/4, pp.139/42, ill., as Rottermondt. Thieme-Becker, Knstler Lexikon, XXIX, 1935, p.99 Catalogus Gemeentemuseum Den Haag, 1935, p.222, as Rottermondt. J.G. van Gelder, "P. Rottermondt in Engeland", Nederlands Kunsthistorisch Jaarboek, I, 1947. B.J.A. Renckens, "Pieter Rottermondt en Jan Litma II", Oud Holland, LXVI, 1951, pp.59/61. F.E. Wissman, Seventeenth century Dutch and Flemish paintings from the collection of Hans Klenk, 1977, p.17, as Rottermondt. W. Sumowski, Gem„lde der Rembrandt Schler, 1983, I, p.87, note 52; IV, p.2593, note 28. EXHIBITION The Hague, Gemeentemuseum, 1932-1960 (on loan, as Rottermondt). Leyden, Stedelijk Museum De Lakenhal, Rondom Rembrandt, 1968, no.1, p.1, ill. NOTES Bleker's authorship of the present lot was first published in the catalogue of the Leyden exhibition catalogue, see above, after his signature and the date were revealed during cleaning prior to the exhibition. As first observed by Wissman, loc. cit., who was not aware of the discovery of the signature, the landscape setting is similar to that in Bleker's picture of 1640 of The Adoration of the Magi, recorded in the Klenk collection, Zurich (W.Sumowski, op. cit., p.113, ill.). Sumowski, ibid., p.85, regards this latter picture as Bleker's most important work, in which he demonstrated an early awareness of Rembrandt's great contribution to history painting by placing Biblical subjects in landscape settings, thereby enhancing the poetic atmosphere. As in the Adoration of the Magi, while the landscape in the present picture remains brown in tonality, the focus is on the main protagonists in the centre foreground. The artist, now little known, was famous in his own time; noted by W.Sumowski, op. cit., p.84, he is recorded in Haarlem and is thought to have been trained by Jacob Pynas.