Item | Waddesdon Manor

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artist or maker

Ter Borch, Gerard (b.1617, d.1681)

Date

1675

Place of production

Holland, Netherlands

Medium

oil on canvas

Type of object

paintings

Accession number

2572

Large oil painting of an interior, showing two men and a woman making music. The woman is seated on the right, behind a table, with her foot on a warmer. She turns the page of a music book on the table. She wears a gold fur-trimmed jacket, a white silk dress; her hair is decorated with ribbons and jewels. One of the men sits opposite. He wears military-style clothes including a bandolier and carries a sword, his sleeves are heavily embroidered with gold thread; his collar and sleeves are decorated with lace and pearls. They are both playing instruments - the woman, a theorbo and the man, a lute - and look at each other. The man is perhaps singing. The second man stands between them, leaning forward on the back of a chair. He is dressed in a dark hat, lace cravat and cloak. He looks at the seated man.

A full wine glass stands on a tray on the table. On the back wall, there are two small landscape paintings flanking a door and a chair. To the left, there are two painted panels on the wall, and the jutting-out corner of the room.

Commentary

Gerard Ter Borch made many paintings of ambiguous love encounters between elegantly dressed people in rich interiors. This late example shows a man playing the lute. He may be a client, music partner, or suitor of the woman opposite him playing the more unusual two-necked instrument called a theorbo.

The man standing between the couple may be a musical instructor but it is unclear; his presence adds to the uncertain nature of the couple's relationship. The woman's dress shows ter Borch's skill at rendering shimmering satin and soft fur. A painter of portraits and genre scenes, ter Borch specialised in reproducing the luxurious fabrics and interiors of well-to-do 17th-century Dutch society.

There is an earlier version of this composition in the Toledo Art Museum that is signed and dated to the 1660s (52.9). It seems that Ter Borch copied the composition several years later, probably because it proved popular with his patrons who could enjoy puzzling over its meaning. The versions at Waddesdon and Toledo are very close. There are some minor variations in the far contours of the lute player's face, perhaps a result of overpainting. The Toledo painting is also 3 to 4 cm larger than the Waddesdon version which may have been cut down at some point. Other paintings by ter Borch in Cincinnati Art Museum (1927.421); J. Paul Getty Museum (97.PA.47); and the National Gallery, London (NG864), attest to the popularity of the theme of the music-making couple and the attendant man.

This was one of a number of paintings that Ferdinand de Rothschild acquired from the celebrated Six collection in Amsterdam. The painting was originally in the collection of Pieter van Winter. Several paintings from the Van Loon collection now at Waddesdon were also once in this collection.

Phillippa Plock, 2011

Physical description

Dimensions (mm) / weight (mg)

825 x 667
805 x 650

Signature & date

signed and dated, lower right on foot warmer: G. T. [bor]ch / 16[7]5 [G. T. in monogram]

History

Provenance

Owned by N. C. Hasselaar (b.1701, d.1743); bought for Willem Lormier (b.1682, d.1758) at N. C. Hasselaar sale, Amsterdam, 26 April 1742, lot no. 11, for 670 florins; sold in the Willem Lormier sale, The Hague, 4 July 1763, lot no. 286 for 725 florins; acquired by J. M. Quinkhard (d. circa 1773); bought by Pothoven from J. M. Quinkhard sale, Amsterdam, 15 March 1773, lot no. 2, for 650 florins; acquired by Pieter Locquet (d. circa 1783); bought by Van Dijk from the Pieter Locquet sale, Amsterdam, 22 September 1783 lot no. 64, for 3,850 florins; owned by Claude Tolozan (b.1728, d.1796); bought by Alexandre-Joseph Paillet (b.1743, d.1814) at the Claude Tolozan sale, Paris, 23 Feb 1801, lot no. 120, for 4,010FF; probably purchased by Pieter van Winter (b. 1745, d. 1807) from Paillet; by descent to his daughter Lucretia van Winter (b. 1785, d. 1845); through Lucretia's marriage to Hendrik Six van Hillegom (b.1790, d.1847); by descent to the heirs of Hendrik six van Hillegom; acquired by Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild (b.1839, d.1898) from the 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

Royal Academy Exhibition, London, 1952-53, no. 411, lent by James de Rothschild.

Collection

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

Bibliography

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. 4, p. 135, no. 57
Cornelis Hofstede de Groot; A Catalogue Raisonné of the Works of the Most Eminent Dutch Painters of the Seventeenth Century. Vols 5-8 [1907-1927]; Bishops Stortford; Chadwick Healey; 1976; vol. 5, no. 140
Eduard Plietzsch; Gerard ter borch; Vienna; Schroll; 1944; no. 92
Christopher White, Dutch and Flemish Paintings at Waddesdon Manor, Gazette des Beaux-Arts, 54, August 1959, 67-74; pp. 70-72, fig. 5.
S J Gudlaugsson; Gerard Ter Borch; 2 vols; M. Nijhoff; 1959-1960; vol. 1, no. 271.
Ellis Waterhouse, Anthony Blunt; Paintings: The James A. de Rothschild Collection at Waddesdon Manor; Fribourg; Office du Livre, The National Trust; 1967; pp. 170-171, cat. no. 72.
The Toledo Museum of Art: European Paintings; Toledo; The Toledo Museum of Art; 1976; p. 26.
Ben Broos; Great Dutch Paintings from America; Zwolle; Waanders Publishers; 1990; p. 178, fig. 4.
Joshua Reynolds, Harry Mount; A Journey to Flanders and Holland; Cambridge; Cambridge University Press; 1996; pp. 101, 105, fig. 62.
Jolynn Edwards; Alexandre-Joseph Paillet: expert et marchand de tableaux à la fin du XVIII siècle; Paris; Arthena; 1996; pp. 67, 91, 127, 294, ill.
♦; 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; p. 123, fig. 30.
♦; 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. 218, no. 24.
Tzveton Todorov; L'Eloge du quotidien; Paris; Editions Adam Biro; 1998; p. 38, fig. 19.
♦; Arthur K Wheelock Jr.; Gerard ter Borch; National Gallery of Art, Washington, 7 November 2004 - 30 January 2005; The Detroit Institute of the Arts, Detroit, 27 February - 22 May 2005; Washington, D.C.; The American Federation of Arts, National Gallery of Art; 2004; p. 172, fig. 2.
♦; Everhard Korthals Altes, The Eighteenth-Century Gentleman Dealer Willem Lormier and the International Dispersal of Seventeenth-Century Dutch Paintings, Simiolus: Netherlands Quarterly for the History of Art, 28, 2000-2001, 251-311; p. 265, n. 52.
Everhard Korthals Altes; De verovering van de internationale kunstmarkt door de zeventiende-eeuwse schilderkunst: enkele studies over de verspreiding van Hollandse schilderijen in de eerste helft van de achttiende eeuw; Leiden; Primavera Press; 2003; p. 73.
♦, ♦; Michael Hall, Bric-a-Brac: A Rothschild Memoir of Collecting, Apollo, 166, July 2007-August 2007, 50-77; pp. 63-64, ill.

Related files

- http://www.getty.edu/art/gettyguide/artObjectDetails?artobj=113249 [accessed 14 July 2011, related painting in the Getty, 97.PA.47]
- http://www.getty.edu/art/gettyguide/artObjectDetails?artobj=113249 [accessed 14 July 2011, related painting in the Getty, 97.PA.47]

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