Until 28 January, the grounds are open on Saturdays and Sundays only. The house in now closed and will reopen from 20 March.

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A Girl with a Basket of Fruit at a Window

On display in:

Morning Room

Order image © All images subject to copyright

artist or maker

Dou, Gerrit (b.1613, d.1675)

Date

1657

Place of production

  • Leiden, Netherlands

Medium

  • oil on panel

Type of object

  • paintings

Accession number

2573

Small oil painting of a girl in a maid's outfit leaning out of a window. She has a basket of fruit in her left hand, and holds back a tapestry curtain with her right hand, revealing a scene of a gentleman playing a violin and a lady holding a book with her hand raised.

On a ledge in front of the arched window, from left to right, there is a terracotta pot with mascaron and foliate decoration containing a flowering plant, possibly pinks; a snail; and a dead chicken. On the right of the niche, there is an ornamental bird perch with a hanging glass container beneath. In the room behind, there is a window to the left, with a small bird cage next to it. On the back wall there is a painting with a man or knight on a horse and a seated man possibly begging.

Commentary

A serving girl pulls back a curtain and offers a basket of fruit. Considered to be one of Dou's most important works, the painting was once coveted by a collector esteemed by Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild, the Prince Regent, later George IV. Dou's rendition of the girl and the light makes it a particularly fine example of a subject he repeated several times: the depiction of figures in arched windows.

The finely rendered tapestry curtain lends a theatricality to the scene, as well as symbolising the wealth of the genteel couple making music in the background. Their harmonious activity is reflected both in the well-ordered environment and Dou's balanced composition. The painting may have hidden erotic meanings because of the proximity of the dead bird to the girl, the empty bird perch, and the birdcage in the background. 'Vogel', Dutch for bird, was also a term for copulation. The dead bird as well as the briefly-blooming flowers also bring to mind the swift passage of time and the certainty of death.

It has been suggested that there is a small self-portrait in the glass hanging from the perch on the right. There is a very hazy mark which could represent a figure, but this is by no means certain. When devising the composition, Dou may have had a classical story in mind that was about artistic identity and rivalry. In Pliny's account of Parrhasius and Zeuxis, the two painters competed to see who could paint the most realistic work. Whereas birds tried to eat Zeuxis's painted grapes when the painting was unveiled; Parrhasius tricked his rival. He asked Zeuxis to pull back the curtain to show his work, only for Zeuxis to discover that the curtain was actually painted. Dou made many paintings of maids or musicians in similar arched windows. From at least 1757, this painting was considered to be a companion picture to 'The Trumpeter', Louvre, inv. 1216 which has a richly decorated velvet curtain.

Recent research has shown that this painting was sent on spec by a Dutch painting dealer to the ambitious and wealthy English nobleman, James Brydges, in 1710. In 1818, when the painting was back in the Netherlands, in the collection of Lucretia van Winter, the Prince Regent, later George IV, instructed his agent William Buchanan to offer a price of 18,000 florins for the work. It was considered to be the best piece in Lucretia's collection. The painting was copied by Jacob Cats (1741-1799) in a watercolour of 1786 when it was in the Doekscheer collection. In the early 19th century, J. van der Pijl drew the painting when it was in the collection of Jan Six.

Phillippa Plock, 2011

Physical description

Dimensions (mm) / weight (mg)

372 x 287 - sight

Signature & date

signed and dated, lower centre on ledge: G DOV. 16[5]7

Labels

Morning Room
Gerrit Dou
Left of fireplace
Label
on verso

Morning room
Left of fireplace
Extreme right (Bottom)
Label
on verso

124
Label
on verso, circular label

History

Provenance

  • Owned by Jan van Beuningen; sold by van Beuningen to James Brydges, later 1st Duke of Chandos (b.1674, d.1744) with two other Dou paintings in January 1710; sold in the Brydges sale, 'Pictures ... consisting of great variety of valuable pictures, by the most celebrated Italian, French and Flemish masters', auctioneer Mr Cock, London, 6 May 1747; owned by Heer Loot van Santvoort (d. pre 1757); inherited by his widow Margareta Verhamme (d.1757); bought by van Diemen for Gerret Braamcamp (d. 1771) at the Margareta Verhemme (or Margarita Verhammer) sale, 16-17 March 1757, lot no. 3, for 2,225 florins; bought by H. de Winter from Gerret Braamcamp sale, Amsterdam 31 July 1771 no. 55, for 4,010 florins; owned by Nicolas Doekscheer (d.1789), where seen by Jacob Cats in 1786; acquired by Jan Jacob de Bruyn (d.1798) via his agent Fouquet at the Nicolas Doekscheer sale, 9 September 1789, no. 14, for 7,500 florins; acquired by Pieter van Winter (b.1745, d.1807) via his agent Jan Yver (b.1747, d.1814) from the Jan Jacob de Bruyn sale, Amsterdam, 12 September 1798, for 8,100 florins, lot 17; by descent to his daughter Lucretia van Winter (b.1785, d.1845; through her marriage to Hendrik Six van Hillegom (b.1790, d.1847) in 1822; acquired by Ferdinand de Rothschild (b.1839, d.1898) from the heirs of Six van Hillegom collection in 1897; inherited by his sister Alice de Rothschild (b.1847, d.1922); inherited by her great-nephew James de Rothschild (b.1878, d.1957); bequeathed to Waddesdon (National Trust) in 1957.

Exhibition history

  • Amsterdam: Arti, 1867 (Hofstede de Groot)

Collection

  • Waddesdon (National Trust)
  • Bequest of James de Rothschild, 1957
Bibliography

Bibliography

  • de Bastide; Le Temple des Arts, ou Le Cabinet de M. Braamcamp; Amsterdam; [n. pub.]; 1766; p. 82.
  • John Smith; A Catalogue Raisonné of the Works of the Most Eminent Dutch, Flemish and French Painters; 9 vols; London; Smith and Son; 1829-1842; vol. 1, pp. 13-14, no. 40.
  • Wilhelm Martin; Gerard Dou: des Meisters Gemälde; Stuttgart; Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt; 1913; p. 113.
  • Cornelis Hofstede de Groot; A Catalogue Raisonné of the Works of the Most Eminent Dutch Painters of the Seventeenth Century. Vols 1-4 [1907-1927]; Bishops Stortford; Chadwick Healey; 1976; vol. 1, p. 404, no. 174.
  • Clara Bille; De Tempel der Kunst: Het Kabinet van den Heer Braamcamp; 2 vols; Amsterdam; J. H. de Bussy; 1961; vol. 2, cat. 55, ill. ; vol. 2, p. 95, cat. 55.
  • Ellis Waterhouse, Anthony Blunt; Paintings: The James A. de Rothschild Collection at Waddesdon Manor; Fribourg; Office du Livre, The National Trust; 1967; pp. 138-139, cat. no. 57.
  • ♦; H. van Eeghen, De verzamelaar Nicolaas Doekscheer, Bulletin van het Rijksmuseum, 19, 1971, 173-82; p. 175, fig. 2.
  • Mariet Westermann; The Amusements of Jan Steen; Zwolle; Waanders Publishers; 1996; pp. 240, 239, fig. 143.
  • ♦; H Perry Chapman, Wouter Th. Kloek, Arthur K Wheelock Jr.; Jan Steen: Painter and Storyteller; National Gallery of Art, Washington, 28 April - 18 August 1996; Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, 21 September 1996 - 12 January 1997; Washington, D.C.; National Gallery of Art; 1996; pp. 126-28, fig. 1.
  • ♦; Ruud Priem, The "Most Excellent Collection" of Lucretia Johanna van Winter: The Years 1809-22, with a Catalogue of the Works Purchased, Simiolus: Netherlands Quarterly for the History of Art, 25, 1997, 103-196; pp. 118, 124, 170, 172, 182-83, fig. 20.
  • ♦; Ruud Priem, Catalogue of Old Master Paintings Acquired by Lucretia Johanna van Winter, 1809-22, Simiolus: Netherlands Quarterly for the History of Art, 25, 1997, 197-230; p. 219, no. 44.
  • Martha Hollander; An Entrance for the Eyes: Space and Meaning in Seventeenth-Century Dutch Art; Berkeley; University of California Press; 2001; p. 71, fig. 30.
  • Stephanie Sonntag; Ein Schau-Spiel der Malkunst: Das Fensterbild in der holländischen Malerei des 17. und 18. Jahrhunderts; Berlin; Deutscher Kunstverlag Munchen; 2006; p. 265, fig. 9, pp. 43, 44,74, 88, 93, 117, 127, 204, 206, 208, 216, 241, 242
  • Koenraad Jonckheere; The Auction of King William's Paintings, 1713 : Elite International Art Trade at the End of the Dutch Golden Age; Amsterdam; John Benjamin; 2008; pp. 140, 143, 267 A4, fig. 95; with information about Jan van Beuningen.
  • Peter Hecht; 125 Jaar openbaar kunstbezit : met steun van de Vereniging Rembrandt; Zwolle; Waanders Publishers; 2008; p. 40, fig. 46.
  • ♦; Juliette Hibou, Waddesdon Manor: l'histoire d'une passion, Dossier de l'art, 172, March 2010, 93-95; p. 95, ill.
  • B Wieseman, P Chapman, Wayne Franits; Vermeer's Women: Secrets and Silence; New Haven; Yale University Press, Fitzwilliam Museum (Cambridge); 2011; p. 77.

Related files

Other details

Subject person

  • Gerrit Dou, possibly pictured
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