Lot 233: JAN LE DUCQ

JAN LE DUCQ THE HAGUE 1629-1676 A GROUP PORTRAIT OF THE LOTH FAMILY IN A LANDSCAPE signed and dated lower right: J I Ducq / 1660 oil on canvas 53 by 43 1/2 in.; 135.1 by 110.2 cm.

Commissioned by the Loth family, directly from the artist;
Thence by descent to their grandchild, married to François Hoyer, Amsterdam;
Thence by descent to his grandchild, Hendrik David M(e)ispelblom Beyer, Haarlem, by 1907 (all of the above according to a label on the reverse);
Thence by descent;
Anonymous sale (''The Property of an Aristocratic Family'), Amsterdam, Sotheby's, 7 May 2008, lot 77;
There purchased by the present owner.

Painted in 1660, the present large family portrait is a rare example of this type of work in the oeuvre of Le Ducq, who was predominantly an animal painter specialising in dogs. He was one of the co-founders of the Confrerie Pictura, a painters guild in The Hague established in 1656, but only officialy registered four years later, the year this picture was executed.(1 )His few known portraits show the clear influence of Jan Mijtens (1614-1670), who was particularly skilled at the representation of family groups. This kind of classical group portrait, in which the sitters are clad in colourful dress (often a combination of contemporary fashion and fantasy costumes) and set in an arcadian landscape, were in great demand in courtly circles in The Hague. Soon this type of formal depiction was favored by the city's upper class, such as the sitters in this portrait who, according to a label on the reverse, can be identified as members of the Loth family.

1. E. Buijsen, Haagse Schilders in de Gouden Eeuw. Het Hoogsteder Lexicon van alle schilders werkzaam in Den Haag, 1600-1700, Den Haag/Zwolle 1998, p. 301.