Portrait of Suzanna Moor (1608-57)

The support is a canvas of an average weave density, not quite as fine as that of the pendant (SK-A-3741), and has a seam approximately 12.5 cm from the bottom. It has been lined, probably using glue. The ground layer is most likely white. The sitter’s face is rather schematically painted with a soft touch. The ruff is stiffly executed, and fades away towards the background. Broad brushstrokes were used to render the draperies and the tablecloth, which were painted rather stiffly.

Fair. The flesh tones in the face have turned greenish. The right hand with the pearl bracelet is completely overpainted, and retouching and overpainting is also visible in the skirt. The paint layers are abraded, particularly in the dark passages, and there are small losses throughout. The varnish is discoloured and has an uneven sheen.

...; by descent to Maria S.T. de Wildt (1766-1851), with pendant SK-A-3741; transferred for safekeeping to the Charter Room in Leiden Town Hall, 13 April 1838, with pendant SK-A-3741;¹¹Note RMA. removed at the request of Frans de Wildt (1805-69), Amsterdam, 4 May 1839, with pendant SK-A-3741;²²Note RMA....; by descent to Frans de Wildt (1805-69), Amsterdam, with pendant SK-A-3741;³³Kramm III, 1859, p. 871. his daughter, Johanna E. Backer, née de Wildt (1831-1908), with pendant SK-A-3741;⁴⁴Meijer 1888, p. 226. her daughter, Jonkvrouw Anna M. Blaauw, née Backer (1860-1941), ’s-Graveland, with pendant SK-A-3741;⁵⁵Six 1911, p. 130; Amsterdam 1925, p. 25. her husband, Abraham J. Blaauw (1861-1945), ’s-Graveland, with pendant SK-A-3741;...; collection P. van Leeuwen-Boomkamp, Hilversum/Naarden, with pendant SK-A-3741; SNK, with pendant SK-A-3741; from which on loan to the museum, with pendant SK-A-3741, 1948; purchased by the museum, with pendant SK-A-3741, July 1949⁶⁶The provenance of the pendant reconstructed by Jansen in Amsterdam 1993, p. 598.

ObjectNumber: SK-A-3742

This full-length portrait of Suzanna Moor was painted as the companion piece to that of her second husband, Laurens Reael, to whom she was married from 1629 until his death in 1637 (SK-A-3741).⁷⁷See the entry on SK-A-3741, which was painted by Cornelis van der Voort. Like him, she is shown standing beside a table covered with a red cloth. A curtain hangs on the right, and on the left there is a view into a room at the back, which is not quite aligned with the one in her husband’s portrait.

It is not known who painted this likeness. Cornelis van der Voort, who painted Reael, is not a candidate. Not only do the two works differ in style, but he died several years before the couple married.⁸⁸Wolleswinkel 1987, col. 399, note 7. Moor’s portrait is well below the standard of Reael’s.⁹⁹Ekkart 1988a, p. 9. The attribution to Van der Voort had already been rejected on stylistic grounds in Meijer 1888, p. 227, note 1. Other candidates who have been put forward, such as Jan van Ravesteyn¹⁰¹⁰Amsterdam 1845, p. 9, no. 117; Amsterdam 1858, p. 58, no. 1779. and Thomas de Keyser,¹¹¹¹Kramm III, 1859, p. 871. are equally unacceptable.

In 1988, Ekkart associated the painting with a portrait by an unknown Dutch artist that was auctioned in 1951.¹²¹²Ekkart 1988a, pp. 9-10 (ill.). That panel, measuring 110 x 88 cm, was sold as an anonymous Spanish work. It is a half-length of the same woman wearing the same clothes and jewellery, with only the left hand being in a slightly different position. The question is whether the Rijksmuseum painting is a modified copy after the one sold in 1951 or after another work, but it is very likely that it is a copy, given the schematic nature of the face and stiffness in the ruff and folds of the draperies. It is not inconceivable that it was painted long after Suzanna Moor’s death.

Gerdien Wuestman, 2007

See Bibliography and Rijksmuseum painting catalogues
See Key to abbreviations and Acknowledgements

This entry was published in J. Bikker (ed.), Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth Century in the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, I: Artists Born between 1570 and 1600, coll. cat. Amsterdam 2007, no. 428.

Meijer 1888, p. 227, note 1; Ekkart 1988a, pp. 7-10; Jansen in Amsterdam 1993, pp. 598-99

1960, p. 332, no. 2591 A 2 (as attributed to Cornelis van der Voort); 1976, p. 588, no. A 3742 (as Cornelis van der Voort); 1992, p. 91, no. A 3742 (as Northern Netherlands School, c. 1625); 2007, no. 428

G. Wuestman, 2007, 'anonymous, Portrait of Suzanna Moor (1608-57), in or after 1629', in J. Bikker (ed.), Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth Century in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: hdl.handle.net/10934/RM0001.COLLECT.9841