Cast.

Complete with the original dark-green base executed in pietra nefritica verde scura.¹¹G. Borghini (ed.), Marmi antichi, Rome 1998, p. 269 (no. 112).

From the artist, fl. 5,000, to the George Hendrik Breitner Fonds (Fundatie Van den Santheuvel, Sobbe), Amsterdam, 1982; by which, donated to the museum, 1982

Object number: BK-1982-30

The woman portrayed here is the painter Louise Maria (‘Lou’) Koning-Loeber, the daughter of an affluent Dutch industrialist and a modernist painter of some renown.²²F. Bless and N.T. Scheeres, Lou Loeber: Overzichtstentoonstelling, exh. cat. Franeker Museum ’t Coopmanshûs, 1982-83. Influenced by Dutch painters Mondrian – whose work she came to know via Sal Slijper, an art collector in the town of Laren – and Bart van der Leck, Loeber’s geometrically composed works most commonly centred on industrial and technological themes. Only later would Loeber turn to a more abstract style and substantially freer brushstroke. At no point, however, did abstraction in her work come to supersede the recognizability her chosen subject.

The maker of this bronze head is Petronella Huberta (‘Nel’) van Lith (1932-2025), daughter of the sculptor Hubert van Lith (1908-1977) and a student of the sculptor Piet Esser (1914-2004) at the Rijksacademie voor beeldende Kunsten in Amsterdam. Van Lith’s portrait style reflects the academy’s post-impressionist teachings propagated to the end of the twentieth century, initially under Bronner and later under Esser. The present work has much in common with Esser’s style, specifically in terms of the loose, but concise modellé and the utmost lively treatment of the textural surface, with impressions made by the modelling stylus, clay knife and fingers forming leitmotifs.

Van Lith’s portrait was made as an autonomous work, as her familiarity with the painter in fact dated back to her childhood in Laren. For the first time in almost forty years, she endeavoured to seek contact with Loeber, after the then elderly painter attended an exhibition of Van Lith’s work held at the Singer Museum (also in Laren) in 1981, Fascinated by Loeber’s extraordinary face with its ‘exquisite Käthe Kollwitz mouth’, Van Lith proposed doing her portrait. Loeber agreed, remarking somewhat derisively: ‘some say I resemble a Neanderthal’. Van Lith’s detailed, colourful account relates the process of the portrait’s making:

‘In January or February 1982, I went to visit [Loeber] in her little room, with all the things needed for the sculpting. The weather was terribly grey and misty, with a tall conifer in front of the not so big, low window. Lou sat across the table from me, which I had carefully cleared off [...] So, [plastic] rubbish bags covering the table, on top of that the construction and lots of clay, clay knife and wood to pat and stroke the head into shape, and, of course, the plant sprayer to keep the clay wet. I was sitting on my knees to be at the same level as Lou and the head; in the process, a large painting, propped up against a cabinet behind me, kept on falling over whenever I changed my position a little. I kept hoping she wouldn’t notice. The window was left of Lou, I couldn’t walk around [her]; she was also trapped between the wall and the table. In a chair with armrests, leaning more and more to the right. Only when she got up to make tea and offered me a jittery cup of tea could I briefly see the right half of her face. At the end of the posing session, I sprayed the portrait wet, covered it meticulously with a rubbish bag, and very carefully brought it to the nursing home reception desk and placed it under the counter with the urgent request to keep a close eye on it. I was most willingly assured of this.’

‘The next day, again clearing off the table, laying all her heaps of drawings on her bed in the same order, plastic bags, clay and head, etc., on the table and just get started. The light outside was gone. After working and talking for a couple hours including breaks, I couldn’t see anything more for me to do. That the head might already be ‘done’ in two afternoon sessions was simply out of the question, that was a preposterous idea. Yet I really didn’t know what to do; I was extremely ambivalent. And once again the head, together with the rest of the clay rubbish, went under the front desk of those sweet nursing home ladies. Once I got home, I called my youngest daughter, reported what had happened and asked her to go with me the next day to meet Lou and to give me her immediate critical opinion as to what was going on with the head: because I simply didn’t get it. Daughter Barbara has feeling, talent, brains and unsullied eyes.’

‘The third, grey day, after an introduction and coffee, Lou in her chair, the portrait and the rest on the table. Barbara eyeing the head and Lou, [while] circling around it inquiringly. I was able to turn the clay head on a newspaper and the plastic. Suddenly, Barbara declared harshly: “Don’t touch it any further, the head is finished!” All I did after that was scoop out a bit of one nostril. I was pretty astonished: only two days in very dark weather, impossible. Home the next day started casting the head in plaster. Of course, I immediately went to Lou to show [her] the plaster head. The nursing home ladies were also excited because Lou’s lock of hair was on the right side!’ ³³Written correspondence Nel van Lith to Frits Scholten, July 2010: In Januari of Februari 1982 ben ik bij haar gekomen in haar kleine kamertje, met al ‘t spul wat nodig was om te boetseren. Het was verschrikkelijk grauw en mistig weer, met een hoge conifeer voor het niet zo grote en lage raam. Lou zat tegenover me aan de tafel, die ik zorgvuldig leeg gemaakt had. (...) Dus, vuilniszakken op tafel, daarop de constructie en veel klei, kleimes en hout om de kop in elkaar te meppen en te aaien, en natuurlijk de plantenspuit om de klei nat te houden. Ik zat op mijn knieën om op gelijke hoogte te zijn met Lou en met de kop, daarbij viel steeds een groot schilderij òm dat achter me tegen een kast stond, wanneer ik een beetje van houding veranderde. Steeds hoopte ik dat ze het niet zou merken. Het raam was links van Lou, ik kon niet om Lou heen lopen, zij zat ook klem tussen muur en tafel. In een stoel met leuningen, steeds schever gezakt naar rechts. Alleen toen ze thee ging zetten en me een bibberig kopje thee aanbood kon ik eventjes haar rechter gezichts-helft bekijken. Aan het eind van de poseersessie heb ik het portret nat gespoten en met een vuilniszak er zorgvuldig omheen, hééél voorzichtig naar de ingangsbalie van het tehuis gebracht en onder de toonbank gezet met het dringende verzoek er goed op te passen. Dat werd me volgaarne beloofd. De volgende dag weer opnieuw de tafel ruimen, al haar stapeltjes aantekeningen in dezelfde volgorde op haar bed leggen, plasticzakken, klei en kop etc. op tafel en beginnen maar. Het licht buiten was afwezig. Na een paar uur met onderbrekingen gewerkt en gepraat te hebben, wist ik verdomd niet meer wat ik er verder nog aan moest doen. Het kòn gewoon niet dat de kop al ‘klaar’ was in twee middag sessies, dat was een belachelijk idee. Maar ik wist werkelijk niet wat me nog te doen stond, hartstikke onzeker was ik. En weer ging de kop onder de toonbank van lieve zorg-mevrouwen, met al de andere klei-troep er bij. Eenmaal thuis heb ik mijn jongste dochter gebeld, verslag gedaan en haar gevraagd om de volgende dag met me mee te gaan om Lou te ontmoeten en meteen kritisch te kijken wat er met de kop aan de hand was: want dat ik er niets van snapte. Dochter Barbara heeft feeling, talent, hersens en haar ogen niet in haar zak. De derde grijze dag, na kennismaking en koffie, Lou in haar stoel, het portret en de rest op tafel. Barbara spiedend naar de kop en naar Lou, speurend er omheen. De kleikop kon ik draaien op een krant en het plastic. Plotsklaps zei Barbara fel: “Je moet er verder met je poten van af blijven, de kop is àf!” Toen heb ik alleen nog maar één neusgaatje een beetje uitgepeuterd. Ik was tamelijk verbijsterd: maar twéé dagen in hartstikke donker weer, onmogelijk. Thuis de volgende dag begonnen met de kop in gips te gieten. Natuurlijk ben ik meteen naar Lou gegaan om de kop in gips te laten zien. Ook de zorgende vrouwen waren opgetogen omdat de haarlok van Lou de goeie kant op viel!

The present bronze cast of the Loeber portrait – one of four taken from the original plaster model – was acquired in 1982 for the museum through the mediation of Peter Schatborn, then curator of the museum’s Print Room and someone who knew Loeber well.⁴⁴Schatborn’s contact with Lou Loeber arose via his parents, who knew the artist from Blaricum. Through Schatborn’s mediation, the Rijksmuseum also acquired several of Loeber’s sketchbooks (inv. nos. RP-T-1983-66 to -69). Oral communication Peter Schatborn, 5 August 2010. The three remaining bronzes are today in the possession of the artist, her daughter and the Loeber family (the latter cast on temporary loan to the Singer Museum in Laren). Van Lith herself describes this portrait as ‘possibly the most beautiful head that I’ve ever made’.⁵⁵Written correspondence Nel van Lith to Frits Scholten, July 2010. In the Object File, RMA.

Frits Scholten, 2026

hitherto unpublished.

F. Scholten , 2026, 'Nel van Lith, Portrait of Lou Loeber (1894-1983), Amsterdam, 1982', in F. Scholten and B. van der Mark (eds.), European Sculpture in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: https://data.rijksmuseum.nl/20046957