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Artus Quellinus (I) (workshop of)
Diana, After a Model for a High Relief in the Amsterdam Town Hall (now Royal Palace) at Dam Square
Amsterdam, c. 1651 - c. 1664
Technical notes
Modelled in relief and fired.
Provenance
…;1The original terracotta model of the Diana is cited in a list of works for which Quellinus was paid in four instalments between 6 January and 12 September 1651, see Stadsarchief Amsterdam (hereafter: SAA), archive 5039 (Thesaurie Ordinaris), inv. no. 624, no. 5: noch een diana bassereleef 3 voet hooge - 60 [gulden] (an additional diana bas-relief 3 feet high - 60 [guilders]). The marble Diana is cited in a list of works for which Quellinus was paid in four instalments between 24 May and 1 August 1653, see Stadsarchief Amsterdam (hereafter: SAA), archive 5039 (Thesaurie Ordinaris), inv. no. 624, no. 12: een mermere beelt van Diana - 600 [gulden] (a marble statue of Diana - 600 [guilders]); see also M. Jonker et al., In beeld gebracht: Beeldhouwkunst uit de collectie van het Amsterdams Historisch Museum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1995, no. 108. Precisely when (and for what purpose) the present replica of the model was made cannot be said with certainty; in any event no later than 1664, the year in which Quellinus’s Amsterdam studio was closed. from the artist,2K. Fremantle, ‘The Fountains Designed for Van Campen’s Amsterdam Town Hall and Quellien’s Models for Them’, Album discipulorum aangeboden aan J.G. van Gelder ter gelegenheid van zijn 60ste verjaardag (Utrechtse Kunsthistorische Studiën 7), Utrecht 1963, pp. 101-18, esp. p. 104 (note 15): dewijl zijn werk lootse nu affgebroken wordt dat haer Edele [burgemeesters] sullen laten affhalen de modellen vande beelden die hij ten behoeve dezer Stede gemaeckt heeft (while his workshop is being closed, that her Noble [burgomasters] shall have the models of the sculptures that he made on behalf of this City collected). See also H.J. Wiggers, ‘De stad Amsterdam en haar vroegste beeldencollectie’, in M. Jonker et al., In beeld gebracht: Beeldhouwkunst uit de collectie van het Amsterdams Historisch Museum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1995, pp. 60-75, esp. p. 62 (referring to A.W. Kroon, Het Amsterdamsche stadhuis (thans Paleis), 1625-1700: Zijne geschiedenis naar onuitgegeven officiële bronnen bewerkt, Amsterdam 1867, p. 138). transferred to the Town Hall (now Royal Palace) at Dam Square, Amsterdam, 1664;3H.J. Wiggers, ‘De stad Amsterdam en haar vroegste beeldencollectie’, in M. Jonker et al., In beeld gebracht: Beeldhouwkunst uit de collectie van het Amsterdams Historisch Museum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1995, pp. 60-75, esp. pp. 62-64. The models were initially kept in the Thesaurie Ordinaris (Treasury) of the town hall. Around 1700, most were moved to the art cabinet in the kunstkamer (art chamber) on the third floor, see Wegwyzer door Amsterdam, Amsterdam (Nicolaas ten Hoorn) 1713, p. 446. From 1768 on, the task of overseeing the models’ preservation was assigned to the Stadstekenacademie (City Drawing Academy), also located in the aforementioned kunstkamer. In 1769, academy director Cornelis Ploos van Amstel compiled an inventory of all sculptures in the art chamber. This inventory also included Quellinus’s models, see SAA, archive H. 86.003 (Library), Cornelis Ploos van Amstel, Notitie van Boetseersels en Pleisterbeelden enz bewaard wordende op de kunstkamer van het stadhuijs der stad Amsterdam (January 1769). From November 1796 to April 1806, the Stadstekenacademie was obliged to (temporarily) vacate the town hall art chamber on the orders of the French occupier. During this period, it is not known where the models were stored, though presumably they remained in the town hall, albeit without oversight. In April 1806, the models were moved to the rariteitenkamer (curiosity chamber), also called the Diplomatieke Bibliotheek (Diplomatic Library). transferred to the Stadstekenacademie (at two or three successive locations), Amsterdam, 1808;4The collection was moved in 1808, when Louis Napoleon took up residence in the town hall. H.J. Wiggers, ‘De stad Amsterdam en haar vroegste beeldencollectie’, in M. Jonker et al., In beeld gebracht: Beeldhouwkunst uit de collectie van het Amsterdams Historisch Museum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1995, pp. 60-75, esp. pp. 67-68. See also SAA, archive 265 (Stadstekenacademie), inv. nos. 1-4 and 6-54. transferred to the Koninklijke Academie van Beeldende Kunsten (old Exchange of Hendrick de Keyser), Amsterdam, 1821;5H.J. Wiggers, ‘De stad Amsterdam en haar vroegste beeldencollectie’, in M. Jonker et al., In beeld gebracht: Beeldhouwkunst uit de collectie van het Amsterdams Historisch Museum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1995, pp. 60-75, esp. p. 70, referring to SAA, archive 265 (Stadstekenacademie), inv. no. 4 (minutes of 1818-1821). transferred to the Oude Mannenhuis, Amsterdam 1837;6H.J. Wiggers, ‘De stad Amsterdam en haar vroegste beeldencollectie’, in M. Jonker et al., In beeld gebracht: Beeldhouwkunst uit de collectie van het Amsterdams Historisch Museum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1995, pp. 60-75, esp. pp. 70-71. See also SAA, archive PA 681 (Koninklijke Academie van Beeldende Kunsten), inv. no. 7. transferred to the Town Hall at the Prinsenhof, Amsterdam, 1878;7H.J. Wiggers, ‘De stad Amsterdam en haar vroegste beeldencollectie’, in M. Jonker et al., In beeld gebracht: Beeldhouwkunst uit de collectie van het Amsterdams Historisch Museum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1995, pp. 60-75, esp. p. 72. See also SAA, archive H. 86.003 (Library). on loan to the Rijksmuseum, 18878See SAA, archive H. 86.002 (Library). transferred to the Amsterdams Historisch Museum (now: Amsterdam Museum), 1935
ObjectNumber: BK-AM-51-12
Credit line: On loan from the City of Amsterdam
Context
The great wealth and might of the city Amsterdam – the most important merchant city of the Dutch Republic in the seventeenth century – manifested itself in grand public works and countless other public and private buildings. This was especially true of the new town hall on the Dam Square, for which initial plans were already being made as early as 1639. The building’s design was aimed to reflect the power and prosperity that Amsterdam had come to acquire since the closing of the Scheldt in 1585, an event that cost Antwerp its leading economic position in the Low Countries.9P. Vlaardingerbroek, Het paleis van de Republiek, Zwolle 2011, pp. 21-22. The existing town hall, which dated back to the Middle Ages, had become too small to accommodate the rapidly growing civic governmental apparatus and was therefore to be replaced by a new and spacious ‘urban palace’. To carry out this ambitious plan, the city’s burgomasters chose the architect Jacob van Campen (1596-1657).10P. Vlaardingerbroek, Het paleis van de Republiek, Zwolle 2011, p. 36.
In its design, decoration and style, the new Amsterdam town hall was to glorify both the city and its governing council by mirroring illustrious examples from antiquity and its own day: the ancient Roman Republic and the modern Republic of Venice.11K. Fremantle and W. Halsema-Kubes, Beelden Kijken: De kunst van Quellien in het Paleis op de Dam/Focus on Sculpture: Quellien’s Art in the Palace on the Dam, exh. cat. Amsterdam (Royal Palace) 1977, p. 9; F. Scholten, Artus Quellinus: Sculptor of Amsterdam, Amsterdam 2010, p. 15. Designated as the central themes were the three mainstays of Amsterdam’s economic success: good and fair governance, peace and prosperity. The Amsterdam city regents were bestowed the honorary title of vredesvader (father of peace), an appellation alluding to the seminal role these men played in negotiating the Peace of Münster, the treaty of 1648 that ended the war with the Spanish and signalled a new period of unparalleled prosperity.12K. Fremantle and W. Halsema-Kubes, Beelden Kijken: De kunst van Quellien in het Paleis op de Dam/Focus on Sculpture: Quellien’s Art in the Palace on the Dam, exh. cat. Amsterdam (Royal Palace) 1977, p. 16. Through the classicist style of its architecture and the themes depicted in painted and sculptural decoration, this new monumental addition to the city was meant to convey Amsterdam’s standing as a worthy successor to ancient Rome, the geographic source of the Roman Republic’s past power and glory.13P. Vlaardingerbroek, Het paleis van de Republiek, Zwolle 2011, p. 68. Albeit less explicitly, Amsterdam also wished to mirror itself on the Republic of Venice. Both cities had begun as fishing villages and grown to become powerful merchant centres with international allure. Both cities also boasted a stable government firmly grounded on republican principles.14F. Scholten, Artus Quellinus: Sculptor of Amsterdam, Amsterdam 2010, p. 14. Lastly, the decoration programme of the new Amsterdam town hall drew a parallel between the Israelites in the Bible and the present-day inhabitants of the Dutch Republic. Just as the Israelites – also long oppressed by a heathen religion – were led out of Egypt, so too had the Dutch liberated themselves from the yoke of the Spanish king and Catholic idolatry. The inhabitants of the Dutch Republic had God to thank for their freedom and fortune.15P. Vlaardingerbroek, Het paleis van de Republiek, Zwolle 2011, p. 68. All of these associations were to be unified in the new town hall’s realization, made manifest for both the city’s own burghers but also countless visitors from abroad.
In 1648, the Flemish sculptor Artus Quellinus I (1609-1668) – then one of the most successful and talented sculptors in the Low Countries16Prior to travelling to Italy around 1635, Quellinus had already produced work for Stadholder Frederick Henry, see K. Fremantle, The Baroque Town Hall of Amsterdam, Utrecht 1959, pp. 133-34. Upon returning to Antwerp in 1639, his career took off. One important commission he received, just prior to moving to Amsterdam, was a monumental tomb for Count Engelbert van Immerzeel and Helena van Montmorency (Bokhoven, Sint-Antonius Abtkerk), see F. Scholten, Artus Quellinus: Sculptor of Amsterdam, Amsterdam 2010, pp. 9-10. – was hired to devise the sculptural programme of the planned town hall. Having been trained as he sculptor by his father in the Baroque milieu of Rubens in Antwerp, Quellinus travelled to Rome in 1635, where he entered the studio of the Flemish sculptor François du Quesnoy (1594-1643).17K. Fremantle, The Baroque Town Hall of Amsterdam, Utrecht 1959, p. 147. In the words of Du Quesnoy’s biographer, Sandrart: ‘Quellinus made himself very useful when in Rome and there he studied the art of Antiquity with success.’18Joachim von Sandrart, Teutsche Academie der edlen Bau- Bild- und Mahlerey-Künste (ed. C. Klemm), Nördlingen 1994 (original ed. Frankfurt 1675-79), p. 351; K. Fremantle, The Baroque Town Hall of Amsterdam, Utrecht 1959, p. 148. See also C. Theuerkauff, ‘Enkele kanttekeningen bij Artus Quellinus en de ‘antiche Academien’, Bulletin van het Rijksmuseum 50 (2002), pp. 308-19, esp. p. 310. Accordingly, the sculptor’s work displays both elements of Du Quesnoy’s austere Classicism and Rubens’s Baroque. Yet the Amsterdam burgomasters’ decision to place the town hall’s sculptural decoration in Quellinus’s charge was not simply based on his style and qualities as a sculptor: his international experience, knowledge of antique sculpture and ability to run a large studio were also important factors.19F. Scholten, Artus Quellinus: Sculptor of Amsterdam, Amsterdam 2010, p. 12.
The architect of the planned town hall, Jacob van Campen, was ‘artistic director’ of the decoration programme of the building’s exterior and interior in close consultation with his patrons. A number of fairly primitive pen-and-ink sketches and discernible details on the wooden, scale-model maquette show that, especially in this regard, Van Campen had very clear ideas of his own.20H. Vreeken, ‘Quellinus’ boetseersels voor het zeventiende-eeuwse stadhuis op de Dam’, in M. Jonker et al., In beeld gebracht: Beeldhouwkunst uit de collectie van het Amsterdams Historisch Museum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1995, pp. 38-59, esp. pp. 40-41. Quellinus’s task was to transform these ideas and simple sketches into clear and detailed three-dimensional designs. Several terracottas in the Rijksmuseum illustrate this specific stage of the design process. Presented for approval to both Van Campen and the burgomasters charged with making the final decision, these models can be described as vidimi (vidimus (Lat.) = we have seen) in the purest sense. A subsequent stage in this process entailed the detailed realization of these sketch models into working models – scale models, possibly followed by so-called modelli grandi – to be used in the studio for the final execution of monumental sculptures in marble and bronze.
Given the monumental scale of sculptural production accomplished in a relatively short period of time, Quellinus is certain to have had a large workshop to accommodate his many assistants. While information regarding the distribution of tasks remains scant, the diverse modelling on the surviving terracottas rules out the possibility of a single sculptor working on his own. Variations in the level of finishing can also be observed. The first group of terracottas can be described as bozzetti: loosely modelled sketches functioning as preliminary, plastic explorations of a theme or composition (cf. BK-AM-51-10). The second group consists of finished modelli – the aforementioned vidimi – from which the cast replicas were made that served as models in the studio. This category of works can sometimes be identified as such by measuring marks: points, lines and grids drawn in the wet clay to facilitate the design’s reproduction and enlargement in marble or bronze.21H. Vreeken, ‘Quellinus’ boetseersels voor het zeventiende-eeuwse stadhuis op de Dam’, in M. Jonker et al., In beeld gebracht: Beeldhouwkunst uit de collectie van het Amsterdams Historisch Museum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1995, pp. 38-59, esp. pp. 42-43. The third and final group consists of various replicas likewise made in Quellinus’s workshop but ultimately destined for the free market, e.g. as council members’ gifts to friends or as souvenirs privately commissioned by the burgomasters and their retinue to commemorate their role in the building of the town hall.22H. Vreeken, ‘Quellinus’ boetseersels voor het zeventiende-eeuwse stadhuis op de Dam’, in M. Jonker et al., In beeld gebracht: Beeldhouwkunst uit de collectie van het Amsterdams Historisch Museum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1995, pp. 38-59, esp. p. 44.
Entry
The present Diana is one of the terracotta sketches and models made by the Antwerp sculptor Artus Quellinus I (1609-1668) and his assistants in preparation for the sculptural decoration of the new Amsterdam town hall, today the Royal Palace on the Dam Square (for an extensive history of the town hall, its significance and decoration programme, see ‘Context’). After the project’s completion, Quellinus’s Amsterdam studio was closed in 1664. At this time, the city’s burgomasters ordered that all of the remaining works and presentation models be transferred to the new town hall. With this move, the ensemble of fifty-one pieces officially became the property of the city of Amsterdam.23A.W. Kroon, Het Amsterdamsche stadhuis (thans Paleis), 1625-1700: Zijne geschiedenis naar onuitgegeven officiële bronnen bewerkt, Amsterdam 1867, p. 138. A number were transferred to the Rijksmuseum in 1887/88 on a long-term basis. All other works are today preserved at the Amsterdam Museum.
Diana stands frontally before a modelled frame, posed in an elegant contrapposto with her head turned sharply to the left. She holds a burning torch in her right hand and clasps the bow slung over her left shoulder with the other. The goddess wears a short tunic with one breast exposed. Several of the motifs in this representation of Diana can be traced back to Ripa’s descriptions of the moon goddess and the Chariot of the Moon. Her burning torch, for example, refers to her roles as the aenbrengster van ‘t licht aan de jongh geboren kinderkens (bringer of light to new-born children) and the guiding light of shepherds in the night.24Cesare Ripa, Iconologia of uytbeeldingen des Verstands, Amsterdam 1644, p. 270 (Carro della Luna, Koets van de Maene).
The definitive marble version of the present terracotta belongs to a series of eight marble reliefs depicting planetary gods, mounted in the galleries on both sides of the central hall, the Burgerzaal (Citizens’ Hall). The gods were positioned between the doorways to the various office chambers and between the passages to the stairwells.25M. Jonker et al., In beeld gebracht: Beeldhouwkunst uit de collectie van het Amsterdams Historisch Museum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1995, p. 201. The iconography of these reliefs can in part be traced to Cesare Ripa’s Iconologia, of which a Dutch-language edition was published in Amsterdam in 1644.26Cesare Ripa, Iconologia of uytbeeldingen des Verstands, Amsterdam 1644. The reliefs refer to the specific functions of each of the adjoining spaces and together form a cosmological system linked to the statues on the pediments of the building’s façades and the large inlay maps of the Eastern and Western hemispheres in the floor of the main hall. In this manner, Amsterdam and its town hall were symbolically portrayed as the centre of the world and the cosmos.27F. Scholten, Artus Quellinus: Sculptor of Amsterdam, Amsterdam 2010, pp. 19-20.
The marble Diana relief was placed in the south-east corner of the town hall’s south gallery between the doors to the former Thesaurie Ordinaris – the city’s financial department, also responsible for paying Quellinus’s account declarations28S. Faber, J. Huisken and F. Lammertse, Van Heeren, die hunn’ stoel en kussen niet beschaemen: Het stadsbestuur van Amsterdam in de 17e en 18e eeuw – Of Lords, Who Seat Nor Cushion do Ashame: The Government of Amsterdam in the 17th and 18th Centuries, Amsterdam 1987, pp. 36-37. – and the Burgermeesterskamer, where the burgomasters and ex-burgomasters met to discuss key matters at the close of the quarterly period.29S. Faber, J. Huisken and F. Lammertse, Van Heeren, die hunn’ stoel en kussen niet beschaemen: Het stadsbestuur van Amsterdam in de 17e en 18e eeuw – Of Lords, Who Seat Nor Cushion do Ashame: The Government of Amsterdam in the 17th and 18th Centuries, Amsterdam 1987, p. 26. Diana is flanked by two lunettes with putti and fish mounted above the doors (cf. BK-AM-51-20-A and -B). As goddess of the hunt, she is surrounded by the fruits of her bounty: a deer, two large fish, a crab and a lobster. In their respective lunettes, the putti playfully re-enact the hunt, as it were: each holds the slippery tail of a large fish arced along the curve of the central oculus, with horns of plenty spilling a variety of fruit at the putti’s feet. As a whole, the scene represents a befitting ode to the rich ‘hunting bounty’ brought from around the world by the Amsterdam merchants largely responsible for the city’s prosperity during this period.30K. Fremantle, The Baroque Town Hall of Amsterdam, Utrecht 1959, p. 165; K. Fremantle and W. Halsema-Kubes, Beelden Kijken: De kunst van Quellien in het Paleis op de Dam/Focus on Sculpture: Quellien’s Art in the Palace on the Dam, exh. cat. Amsterdam (Royal Palace) 1977, p. 42.
The town hall account books of 1651 list a terracotta model of Diana measuring ‘three feet high’ (= c. 85 cm) for the amount of sixty guilders, together with the model for the Apollo.31SAA, archive 5039 (Thesaurie Ordinaris), inv. no. 624, no. 5. The original Diana model, however, is probably non-extant; the present piece is a reduced replica – circa two feet high – probably made from the master model by an assistant in the workshop. This occurred at some point between 1651 and 1654, the year in which Quellinus closed his workshop. For what purpose the present piece was made and whether it was also commissioned by the city of Amsterdam itself (as opposed to a private patron) are matters as yet unresolved. The fact that it is documented in the town hall’s art cabinet by as early as the eighteenth century nevertheless suggests a municipal commission. Two other replicas of the Diana relief survive to the present day: a smaller replica in Berlin and a larger replica in the collection of Gustav Leonhardt in Amsterdam up until 2014.32The piece in the Bode-Museum, inv. no. 18/79 (57.5 x 30.5 cm) came from a French private collection and was acquired on the Amsterdam art market, see E. Dhanens (ed.), De beeldhouwkunst in de eeuw van Rubens in de Zuidelijke Nederlanden en het prinsbisdom Luik, exh. cat. Brussels (Museum voor Oude Kunst) 1977, no. 107, and sale cat. Amsterdam, Nystad Antiquairs Lochem BV, Sculptures, Amsterdam s.a. (1980), no. 11. The other replica comes from the former Gustav Leonhardt collection, Amsterdam, measuring 70.3 x 38.5 cm. See sale Gustav Leonhardt collection/Barlotti House, Amsterdam, London (Sotheby’s), 29 April 2014, no. 429 (citing the incorrect provenance of Nystad Antiquairs, Amsterdam). The Berlin piece is possibly identical to the same Diana (together with an Apollo) first sold with the collection of the Amsterdam burgomaster Joan de Vries in 1738, and almost a century later, sold with that of the Delft burgomaster E. Sandoz in 1819. All of the aforementioned replicas underscore the relative popularity of Quellinus’s inventions for the new town hall.33See sale collection Joan de Vries, The Hague (Nicolaas van Wouw), 13 October 1738, p. 15, no. 51: Apollo en Diana, van Quellinus twee stuks, zynde de Modellen van die op het Stadhuys te Amsterdam zyn (Apollo and Diana, by Quellinus two pieces, being the Models of those on the Town Hall in Amsterdam) and sale collection E. Sandoz, The Hague (B. Scheurleer), 20 December 1819, p. 172, no. 144: Diana met de zinnebeeldige kenmerken als jagtgodin, de halve maan, de fakkel, de boog, de hinde, de kreeft enz. hoog 1 voet 10 duim, in kleiaarde geboetseerd (en basrelief) door denzelven (Diana with the symbolic attributes as goddess of the hunt: the half-moon, the torch, the bow, the deer, the lobster etc. height 1 foot 10 thumbs, modelled in clay (in bas-relief) by the same (= Quellinus)), and no. 143: Apollo met de zinnebeeldige kenmerken als de slang, Pithon en boog met pijlen enz. ook als God der dichtkunst en der muziek, hoog 1 voet 10 duim, in kleiaarde geboetseerd (en basrelief) door denzelven (Apollo with the symbolic attributes such as the snake Python and the bow with arrows etc. also as God of poetry and music, height 1 foot 10 thumbs, modelled in clay (in bas-relief) by the same (= Quellinus)). Also held in this collection were a Prudentia and Justitia by Quellinus, see inv. nos. BK-AM-51-12 and -19. For a discussion of the various replica groups, see the entry on BK-AM-51-19.
Frits Scholten, 2024
Literature
E. Rümmler, C. Theuerkauff et al., Europäische Barockplastik am Niederrhein: Grupello und seine Zeit, exh. cat. Düsseldorf (Kunstmuseum Düsseldorf) 1971, no. 240, fig. 137; J. Leeuwenberg with the assistance of W. Halsema-Kubes, Beeldhouwkunst in het Rijksmuseum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1973, no. 290, with earlier literature; K. Fremantle and W. Halsema-Kubes, Beelden Kijken: De kunst van Quellien in het Paleis op de Dam/Focus on Sculpture: Quellien’s Art in the Palace on the Dam, exh. cat. Amsterdam (Royal Palace) 1977, p. 82 (no. 15); E. Dhanens (ed.), De beeldhouwkunst in de eeuw van Rubens in de Zuidelijke Nederlanden en het prinsbisdom Luik, exh. cat. Brussels (Museum voor Oude Kunst) 1977, pp. 144-45 (under no. 106); F. Scholten, ‘Twee vroege statuettes van Rombout Verhulst’, Antiek 25 (1990-91), pp. 345-53, esp. pp. 348, 350, fig. 5; E. ten Napel (ed.), Amsterdamse sinjoren 1576-1622: In het voetspoor van Antwerpse immigranten, Amsterdam 1993, p. 79; M. Jonker et al., In beeld gebracht: Beeldhouwkunst uit de collectie van het Amsterdams Historisch Museum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1995, no. 108; H. Vreeken, ‘Quellinus’ boetseersels voor het zeventiende-eeuwse stadhuis op de Dam’, in M. Jonker et al., In beeld gebracht: Beeldhouwkunst uit de collectie van het Amsterdams Historisch Museum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1995, pp. 38-59, esp. pp. 53, 55 (fig. 65e); H.J. Wiggers, ‘De stad Amsterdam en haar vroegste beeldencollectie’, in M. Jonker et al., In beeld gebracht: Beeldhouwkunst uit de collectie van het Amsterdams Historisch Museum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1995, pp. 60-75; F. Scholten, Artus Quellinus: Sculptor of Amsterdam, Amsterdam 2010, p. 23, fig. 31
Citation
F. Scholten, 2024, 'workshop of Artus (I) Quellinus, Diana, After a Model for a High Relief in the Amsterdam Town Hall (now Royal Palace) at Dam Square, Amsterdam, c. 1651 - c. 1664', in F. Scholten and B. van der Mark (eds.), European Sculpture in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: hdl.handle.net/10934/RM0001.COLLECT.24615
(accessed 25 April 2025 18:57:13).Footnotes
- 1The original terracotta model of the Diana is cited in a list of works for which Quellinus was paid in four instalments between 6 January and 12 September 1651, see Stadsarchief Amsterdam (hereafter: SAA), archive 5039 (Thesaurie Ordinaris), inv. no. 624, no. 5: noch een diana bassereleef 3 voet hooge - 60 [gulden] (an additional diana bas-relief 3 feet high - 60 [guilders]). The marble Diana is cited in a list of works for which Quellinus was paid in four instalments between 24 May and 1 August 1653, see Stadsarchief Amsterdam (hereafter: SAA), archive 5039 (Thesaurie Ordinaris), inv. no. 624, no. 12: een mermere beelt van Diana - 600 [gulden] (a marble statue of Diana - 600 [guilders]); see also M. Jonker et al., In beeld gebracht: Beeldhouwkunst uit de collectie van het Amsterdams Historisch Museum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1995, no. 108. Precisely when (and for what purpose) the present replica of the model was made cannot be said with certainty; in any event no later than 1664, the year in which Quellinus’s Amsterdam studio was closed.
- 2K. Fremantle, ‘The Fountains Designed for Van Campen’s Amsterdam Town Hall and Quellien’s Models for Them’, Album discipulorum aangeboden aan J.G. van Gelder ter gelegenheid van zijn 60ste verjaardag (Utrechtse Kunsthistorische Studiën 7), Utrecht 1963, pp. 101-18, esp. p. 104 (note 15): dewijl zijn werk lootse nu affgebroken wordt dat haer Edele [burgemeesters] sullen laten affhalen de modellen vande beelden die hij ten behoeve dezer Stede gemaeckt heeft (while his workshop is being closed, that her Noble [burgomasters] shall have the models of the sculptures that he made on behalf of this City collected). See also H.J. Wiggers, ‘De stad Amsterdam en haar vroegste beeldencollectie’, in M. Jonker et al., In beeld gebracht: Beeldhouwkunst uit de collectie van het Amsterdams Historisch Museum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1995, pp. 60-75, esp. p. 62 (referring to A.W. Kroon, Het Amsterdamsche stadhuis (thans Paleis), 1625-1700: Zijne geschiedenis naar onuitgegeven officiële bronnen bewerkt, Amsterdam 1867, p. 138).
- 3H.J. Wiggers, ‘De stad Amsterdam en haar vroegste beeldencollectie’, in M. Jonker et al., In beeld gebracht: Beeldhouwkunst uit de collectie van het Amsterdams Historisch Museum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1995, pp. 60-75, esp. pp. 62-64. The models were initially kept in the Thesaurie Ordinaris (Treasury) of the town hall. Around 1700, most were moved to the art cabinet in the kunstkamer (art chamber) on the third floor, see Wegwyzer door Amsterdam, Amsterdam (Nicolaas ten Hoorn) 1713, p. 446. From 1768 on, the task of overseeing the models’ preservation was assigned to the Stadstekenacademie (City Drawing Academy), also located in the aforementioned kunstkamer. In 1769, academy director Cornelis Ploos van Amstel compiled an inventory of all sculptures in the art chamber. This inventory also included Quellinus’s models, see SAA, archive H. 86.003 (Library), Cornelis Ploos van Amstel, Notitie van Boetseersels en Pleisterbeelden enz bewaard wordende op de kunstkamer van het stadhuijs der stad Amsterdam (January 1769). From November 1796 to April 1806, the Stadstekenacademie was obliged to (temporarily) vacate the town hall art chamber on the orders of the French occupier. During this period, it is not known where the models were stored, though presumably they remained in the town hall, albeit without oversight. In April 1806, the models were moved to the rariteitenkamer (curiosity chamber), also called the Diplomatieke Bibliotheek (Diplomatic Library).
- 4The collection was moved in 1808, when Louis Napoleon took up residence in the town hall. H.J. Wiggers, ‘De stad Amsterdam en haar vroegste beeldencollectie’, in M. Jonker et al., In beeld gebracht: Beeldhouwkunst uit de collectie van het Amsterdams Historisch Museum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1995, pp. 60-75, esp. pp. 67-68. See also SAA, archive 265 (Stadstekenacademie), inv. nos. 1-4 and 6-54.
- 5H.J. Wiggers, ‘De stad Amsterdam en haar vroegste beeldencollectie’, in M. Jonker et al., In beeld gebracht: Beeldhouwkunst uit de collectie van het Amsterdams Historisch Museum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1995, pp. 60-75, esp. p. 70, referring to SAA, archive 265 (Stadstekenacademie), inv. no. 4 (minutes of 1818-1821).
- 6H.J. Wiggers, ‘De stad Amsterdam en haar vroegste beeldencollectie’, in M. Jonker et al., In beeld gebracht: Beeldhouwkunst uit de collectie van het Amsterdams Historisch Museum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1995, pp. 60-75, esp. pp. 70-71. See also SAA, archive PA 681 (Koninklijke Academie van Beeldende Kunsten), inv. no. 7.
- 7H.J. Wiggers, ‘De stad Amsterdam en haar vroegste beeldencollectie’, in M. Jonker et al., In beeld gebracht: Beeldhouwkunst uit de collectie van het Amsterdams Historisch Museum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1995, pp. 60-75, esp. p. 72. See also SAA, archive H. 86.003 (Library).
- 8See SAA, archive H. 86.002 (Library).
- 9P. Vlaardingerbroek, Het paleis van de Republiek, Zwolle 2011, pp. 21-22.
- 10P. Vlaardingerbroek, Het paleis van de Republiek, Zwolle 2011, p. 36.
- 11K. Fremantle and W. Halsema-Kubes, Beelden Kijken: De kunst van Quellien in het Paleis op de Dam/Focus on Sculpture: Quellien’s Art in the Palace on the Dam, exh. cat. Amsterdam (Royal Palace) 1977, p. 9; F. Scholten, Artus Quellinus: Sculptor of Amsterdam, Amsterdam 2010, p. 15.
- 12K. Fremantle and W. Halsema-Kubes, Beelden Kijken: De kunst van Quellien in het Paleis op de Dam/Focus on Sculpture: Quellien’s Art in the Palace on the Dam, exh. cat. Amsterdam (Royal Palace) 1977, p. 16.
- 13P. Vlaardingerbroek, Het paleis van de Republiek, Zwolle 2011, p. 68.
- 14F. Scholten, Artus Quellinus: Sculptor of Amsterdam, Amsterdam 2010, p. 14.
- 15P. Vlaardingerbroek, Het paleis van de Republiek, Zwolle 2011, p. 68.
- 16Prior to travelling to Italy around 1635, Quellinus had already produced work for Stadholder Frederick Henry, see K. Fremantle, The Baroque Town Hall of Amsterdam, Utrecht 1959, pp. 133-34. Upon returning to Antwerp in 1639, his career took off. One important commission he received, just prior to moving to Amsterdam, was a monumental tomb for Count Engelbert van Immerzeel and Helena van Montmorency (Bokhoven, Sint-Antonius Abtkerk), see F. Scholten, Artus Quellinus: Sculptor of Amsterdam, Amsterdam 2010, pp. 9-10.
- 17K. Fremantle, The Baroque Town Hall of Amsterdam, Utrecht 1959, p. 147.
- 18Joachim von Sandrart, Teutsche Academie der edlen Bau- Bild- und Mahlerey-Künste (ed. C. Klemm), Nördlingen 1994 (original ed. Frankfurt 1675-79), p. 351; K. Fremantle, The Baroque Town Hall of Amsterdam, Utrecht 1959, p. 148. See also C. Theuerkauff, ‘Enkele kanttekeningen bij Artus Quellinus en de ‘antiche Academien’, Bulletin van het Rijksmuseum 50 (2002), pp. 308-19, esp. p. 310.
- 19F. Scholten, Artus Quellinus: Sculptor of Amsterdam, Amsterdam 2010, p. 12.
- 20H. Vreeken, ‘Quellinus’ boetseersels voor het zeventiende-eeuwse stadhuis op de Dam’, in M. Jonker et al., In beeld gebracht: Beeldhouwkunst uit de collectie van het Amsterdams Historisch Museum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1995, pp. 38-59, esp. pp. 40-41.
- 21H. Vreeken, ‘Quellinus’ boetseersels voor het zeventiende-eeuwse stadhuis op de Dam’, in M. Jonker et al., In beeld gebracht: Beeldhouwkunst uit de collectie van het Amsterdams Historisch Museum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1995, pp. 38-59, esp. pp. 42-43.
- 22H. Vreeken, ‘Quellinus’ boetseersels voor het zeventiende-eeuwse stadhuis op de Dam’, in M. Jonker et al., In beeld gebracht: Beeldhouwkunst uit de collectie van het Amsterdams Historisch Museum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1995, pp. 38-59, esp. p. 44.
- 23A.W. Kroon, Het Amsterdamsche stadhuis (thans Paleis), 1625-1700: Zijne geschiedenis naar onuitgegeven officiële bronnen bewerkt, Amsterdam 1867, p. 138.
- 24Cesare Ripa, Iconologia of uytbeeldingen des Verstands, Amsterdam 1644, p. 270 (Carro della Luna, Koets van de Maene).
- 25M. Jonker et al., In beeld gebracht: Beeldhouwkunst uit de collectie van het Amsterdams Historisch Museum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1995, p. 201.
- 26Cesare Ripa, Iconologia of uytbeeldingen des Verstands, Amsterdam 1644.
- 27F. Scholten, Artus Quellinus: Sculptor of Amsterdam, Amsterdam 2010, pp. 19-20.
- 28S. Faber, J. Huisken and F. Lammertse, Van Heeren, die hunn’ stoel en kussen niet beschaemen: Het stadsbestuur van Amsterdam in de 17e en 18e eeuw – Of Lords, Who Seat Nor Cushion do Ashame: The Government of Amsterdam in the 17th and 18th Centuries, Amsterdam 1987, pp. 36-37.
- 29S. Faber, J. Huisken and F. Lammertse, Van Heeren, die hunn’ stoel en kussen niet beschaemen: Het stadsbestuur van Amsterdam in de 17e en 18e eeuw – Of Lords, Who Seat Nor Cushion do Ashame: The Government of Amsterdam in the 17th and 18th Centuries, Amsterdam 1987, p. 26.
- 30K. Fremantle, The Baroque Town Hall of Amsterdam, Utrecht 1959, p. 165; K. Fremantle and W. Halsema-Kubes, Beelden Kijken: De kunst van Quellien in het Paleis op de Dam/Focus on Sculpture: Quellien’s Art in the Palace on the Dam, exh. cat. Amsterdam (Royal Palace) 1977, p. 42.
- 31SAA, archive 5039 (Thesaurie Ordinaris), inv. no. 624, no. 5.
- 32The piece in the Bode-Museum, inv. no. 18/79 (57.5 x 30.5 cm) came from a French private collection and was acquired on the Amsterdam art market, see E. Dhanens (ed.), De beeldhouwkunst in de eeuw van Rubens in de Zuidelijke Nederlanden en het prinsbisdom Luik, exh. cat. Brussels (Museum voor Oude Kunst) 1977, no. 107, and sale cat. Amsterdam, Nystad Antiquairs Lochem BV, Sculptures, Amsterdam s.a. (1980), no. 11. The other replica comes from the former Gustav Leonhardt collection, Amsterdam, measuring 70.3 x 38.5 cm. See sale Gustav Leonhardt collection/Barlotti House, Amsterdam, London (Sotheby’s), 29 April 2014, no. 429 (citing the incorrect provenance of Nystad Antiquairs, Amsterdam).
- 33See sale collection Joan de Vries, The Hague (Nicolaas van Wouw), 13 October 1738, p. 15, no. 51: Apollo en Diana, van Quellinus twee stuks, zynde de Modellen van die op het Stadhuys te Amsterdam zyn (Apollo and Diana, by Quellinus two pieces, being the Models of those on the Town Hall in Amsterdam) and sale collection E. Sandoz, The Hague (B. Scheurleer), 20 December 1819, p. 172, no. 144: Diana met de zinnebeeldige kenmerken als jagtgodin, de halve maan, de fakkel, de boog, de hinde, de kreeft enz. hoog 1 voet 10 duim, in kleiaarde geboetseerd (en basrelief) door denzelven (Diana with the symbolic attributes as goddess of the hunt: the half-moon, the torch, the bow, the deer, the lobster etc. height 1 foot 10 thumbs, modelled in clay (in bas-relief) by the same (= Quellinus)), and no. 143: Apollo met de zinnebeeldige kenmerken als de slang, Pithon en boog met pijlen enz. ook als God der dichtkunst en der muziek, hoog 1 voet 10 duim, in kleiaarde geboetseerd (en basrelief) door denzelven (Apollo with the symbolic attributes such as the snake Python and the bow with arrows etc. also as God of poetry and music, height 1 foot 10 thumbs, modelled in clay (in bas-relief) by the same (= Quellinus)). Also held in this collection were a Prudentia and Justitia by Quellinus, see inv. nos. BK-AM-51-12 and -19.