Lot 104: Peter de Kempeneer, called Pedro Campaña (Brussels 1503-1580)

A triumphal progress of a ruler through the streets of a city
black chalk, pen and brown ink, brown wash heightened with white on blue paper
7 3/8 x 10 1/8 in. (188 x 258 mm.)

SPAIN

One of a series of drawings of Old Testament subjects made by Kempeneer in Brussels after 1563. All the drawings employ the same technique, dimensions and figure type as the present lot. Other examples are in Leiden University, the Courtauld Institute, London, the Stanley Moss Collection, New York, Liège University, the Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge, and the Städelsches Kunsinstitut, Frankfurt, and illustrated in N. Dacos, 'Peter de Kempeneer, Pedro Campana as a draughtsman', Master Drawings, 1987, XXV, 4, pls. 8-20. The drawings are usually numbered in the lower right corner, with the highest recorded being 54. Nicole Dacos suggests that the compositions of some of these drawings may have been inspired by woodcuts executed by Bernard Salomon, called le Petit Salomon, for an illustrated paraphrase of the Bible published in Lyon in 1553. The book circulated widely in the Netherlands and was translated into Latin, German, Spanish, English and Dutch (see the sale catalogue, Christie's, London, 6 July 2004, lots 99-116).
Peter de Kempeneer was from a family of painters and tapestry designers in Brussels. He studied under Bernard van Orley and by 1527 was in Italy, where he stayed for about ten years. He is then recorded in Seville where he became the foremost artist of the city under the name of Pedro Campaña. He painted a great number of altarpieces in Seville and Cordoba before returning to Brussels in 1563. There he replaced Michiel Coxie as the official painter and was put in charge of designing tapestry cartoons. Much of what is known about Kempeneer today comes down to us from the biographer Francisco Pacheco of Seville, whose Libro de verdaderos retratos de ilustres y memorables varones was published in 1599.