Lot 9: Johann Melchior Roos (Frankfurt-am-Main 1659-1731 Kassel(?)) Six brown bears playing in a landscape

Johann Melchior Roos
(Frankfurt-am-Main 1659-1731 Kassel(?))
Six brown bears playing in a landscape signed and dated 'JMRoos./fecit.1718' (lower right)oil on canvas87.1 x 69.2cm (34 5/16 x 27 1/4in).

Provenance: Sale, H. Ruef, Munich, 2-4 July 1975Sale, Galerie Bassenge, Berlin-Grunewald, 26 November 2010, lot 6037With Rafael Valls, London, 2011With Oliver Cyzer Fine Painting, London, where purchased by the present owner in 2013LiteratureH. Jedding, Johann Heinrich Roos: Werke einer Pfälzer Tiermalerfamilie in den Galerien Europas, Mainz, 1996, cat. no. 366, pp. 250, 252, 348, ill.Johann Melchior Roos, the second son and pupil of Johann Heinrich Roos, painted several works of bears in landscapes between 1716-18. The most comparable of these, of the same measurements and also signed and dated 1718, depicts six polar bears in a rocky landscape, and was perhaps intended as a pendant to the present work (see: Jedding, ibid, cat. no. 367).