Portrait of a Male Member of the Van der Borcht Family

…; anonymous sale, Paris (Baudouin and J.-B.P. Lebrun), 16 February 1798 sqq., no. 18 (‘ANTOINE VANDICK. Le portrait d’un amiral célèbre du temps, que l’on dit celui de Ruither [i.e. de Ruyter]; il est vu de grandeur naturelle & en pieds; il semble marcher dans son appartement de droite à gauche, la tête de trois quarts sur sa gauche, portant cheveux courts, avec moustache, collet de chemise, appuyant sa main gauche sur son épée, & tenant de la main droite son manteau noir, ainsi que tout son ajustement; il porte encore un poignard dans sa ceinture, du côté droit. Le fond du tableau est occupé par une partie de colonne élevée sur piédestal, un grand rideau rouge porte ses armes d’une manière pittoresque; au bas une table aussi couverte d’un tapis rouge, sur lequel est placé son chapeau; au-dessus, l’on voit la mer près de la côte, où l’on remarque un combat entre un petit & un fort bâtiment, qui paroît être peint par Bonaventure Peterse […] Hauteur 6 pieds 2 po. Largeur 4 pieds 2 po. [199.8 x 135 cm] T.’), frs. 4,900, ? to the dealer Lespinasse de Langeac, comte d’Arlet,¹¹Information kindly provided by Burton Fredericksen, 16 June 2005. Note RMA. Copy EBNP. or to ‘Coquille’;²²Copy FLNY.…; sale, Hendrik Muilman (1743-1812, Haarlem), Amsterdam (P. van der Schley et al.), 12 April 1813 sqq., no. 44 (‘Dijk (A. van), hoog 81, breed 54 duimen [208.2 x 138.8 cm]. Doek. Een Admiraal of Lid van de Admiraliteit, staande ten voeten uit, bloodhoofds, houdende de regterhand aan het Gevest van zijnen Degen; naast hem zijn Hoed op eene Tafel, in ’t verschiet ziet men Schepen’), bought in at fl. 1,050;³³Copy RKD. his son Willem Ferdinand Mogge Muilman (1778-1849), Amsterdam; his wife Magdalena Antonia Muilman (1788-1853), Amsterdam; her daughter Anna Maria van de Poll-Mogge Muilman (1811-78), Amsterdam; her stepson, Jonkheer Jacobus Salomon Hendrik van de Poll (1837-80); by whom bequeathed to the museum, 1880⁴⁴Provenance from 1813 reconstructed in the unpublished supplements to the internship report of Cornelis van der Bas, RMA, 2003.

ObjectNumber: SK-A-725

Credit line: Jonkheer J.S.H. van de Poll Bequest, Amsterdam

Beneath the discoloured varnish, the coat of arms depicted on the hanging beside the column in the present picture is barely visible today, but can be made out in photographs as being identical (though the colours are invisible to the naked eye) to that on SK-A-101, as was recognized in the 1903 museum catalogue (the sitters had already been assigned the same, correct patronym). It is of the Van der Borcht family of Flanders: ‘D’Argent au chevron d’azur, chargé de trois mâcles d’or’.⁸⁸J.S.F.J. Léon de Herckenrode (ed.), Nobilaire des Pays-bas et du comté de Bourgogne par M. de Vegiano, 2 vols., Ghent 1862-65, I, 1862, p. 254 and fig. 376. In the distance, a three-master, flying a flag at the main of a white saltire against a blue field, is running before the wind beside a lateen rigged two master before a wooded cliff.

Lebrun in the 1798 sale catalogue had already recognized that the distant view was by another hand, as did also the 1960 museum catalogue. That apart, the picture has always been accepted as the work of Anthony van Dyck, although reservations have been expressed by the present author.⁹⁹G. Martin, Review of ‘Van Dyck. The Complete Paintings, by Susan J. Barnes, Nora de Poorter, Oliver Millar and Horst Vey’, The Burlington Magazine 147 (2005), pp. 118-20, esp. p. 119; the proposed attribution there to Jan Boeckhorst is withdrawn. Because of the discoloured varnish, the brushwork is difficult to assess, but in areas of partial, but unrecorded (?) cleaning – of the face, hands, ruff and cuffs – it seems no more than competent. The demeanour of the sitter has none of the refined elegance associated with Van Dyck after his return from Italy. A point of comparison is the Munich full-length Portrait of a Man¹⁰¹⁰Vey in S.J. Barnes, N. de Poorter, O. Millar and H. Vey, Anthony van Dyck: A Complete Catalogue of the Paintings, New Haven (Conn.)/London 2004, no. III.180. beside which it seems inferior; the head is also less well painted than that in the other Van der Borcht portrait (SK-A-101). Such being the case an attribution to a follower of Van Dyck seems justified.

Lebrun attributed the distant view to Bonaventura Peeters (1614-1652); the 1960 museum catalogue suggested Andries van Ertvelt (1590-1652). Neither attribution is acceptable; the hand responsible seems undistinguished and remains unidentified. Since 1911, it has been suggested that the view is perhaps of Dover castle, the nearest port on a rocky shore to the Flemish seaboard. But there is no evidence to substantiate this especially as no white cliffs are visible.

Both Van der Borcht portraits in the Rijksmuseum are unusual for several reasons, not least their both containing the same coat of arms. As no family tree of this family has been traced, it is pointless to speculate about the Christian name of the sitter in this work. Why he was called François in the 1903 museum catalogue and subsequently, sometimes with qualification, is a mystery. Baetens records a François van der Borcht as a merchant trading in Bilbao, circa 1650 (see also under SK-A-101),¹¹¹¹R. Baetens, De nazomer van Antwerpens welvaart. De diaspora en het handelshuis de Groote tijdens de eerste helft der 17de eeuw, 2 vols., Brussels 1976, I, p. 101; first referred to by Vey in S.J. Barnes, N. de Poorter, O. Millar and H. Vey, Anthony van Dyck: A Complete Catalogue of the Paintings, New Haven (Conn.)/London 2004, under no. III.72. but his relationship with Adriaan – the likely sitter in SK-A-101 – is unknown. Glück, followed by Vey, believed that the present portrait was painted before SK-A-101, and dated it to 1627 or 1628;¹²¹²G. Glück, Van Dyck: Des Meisters Gemälde, Klassiker der Kunst, 2nd revised ed., Stuttgart/New York/London 1931, p. 322. the museum catalogues of 1934 and 1960 date it circa 1628. The costume in the two pictures is very similar and can be dated to the 1630s. It seems probable that the sitter in the present picture is the younger of the two, in which case he may well be a son of Adriaan van der Borcht.

The two portraits entered the Rijksmuseum from different sources, but Vey speculates as to whether they might have been painted as pendants because of their having so many features in common. It would have been most unusual for father and son, even if at the time neither was married, to be so depicted. But as he believes that some years separated the execution of the two works, he concluded that ‘they were presumably intended to be hung together’.

If the date of the patent of Adriaan’s nobility of 2 March 1633 is acceptable as a terminus post quem, it seems more likely that the portrait of (?) Adriaan (SK-A-101) was painted first: the head by Van Dyck in 1634/35 and the rest of the figure soon after; the present portrait might then have been executed as the son and heir of the newly ennobled family.

Another unusual feature of both the Van der Borcht portraits is the backgrounds, painted by different hands. In only one or two other extant portraits by Van Dyck from his ‘second’ Antwerp period is this the case; Vey suggested that Van Dyck may not have been present when the background view in one of these – the full-length Equestrian Portrait of the Prince of Arenberg and Barbançon at Holkham Hall, Norfolk – was executed.¹³¹³Vey in S.J. Barnes, N. de Poorter, O. Millar and H. Vey, Anthony van Dyck: A Complete Catalogue of the Paintings, New Haven (Conn.)/London 2004, no. III.66. Martin (G. Martin, Review of ‘Van Dyck. The Complete Paintings, by Susan J. Barnes, Nora de Poorter, Oliver Millar and Horst Vey’, The Burlington Magazine 147 (2005), pp. 118-20, esp. p. 118) suggested that the cavalry troop may have been by Peeter Snayers. The view of Antwerp in the background of the 1631/32 portrait of Marie de Médicis, Vey in S.J. Barnes, N. de Poorter, O. Millar and H. Vey, Anthony van Dyck: A Complete Catalogue of the Paintings, New Haven (Conn.)/London 2004, no. III.105, may be by Van Dyck, as it was prepared for by an autograph drawing, see S. Galletti, D. Jacquot, N. Laneyrie-Dagen et al., Rubens, portraits princiers, exh. cat. Paris (Musée du Luxembourg) 2017-18, no. 34. The background views in the Rijksmuseum portraits may well refer to the shipping interests of the sitters; what appears to be a sea skirmish in the present picture can be taken as a reference to this sitter’s martial propensities, seemingly alluded to by the sword and the short sword at his waistband. However, the sitter is not wearing combat dress, but civilian attire typical of the richer classes. The sword may rather refer to his noble status, while the short sword seems unprecedented in Van Dyck’s oeuvre. Also unusual is the motif of the sitter’s hat placed on the table. While helmets and crowns are so placed in Van Dyck’s oeuvre, the hat only appears on one other occasion, in a portrait which Glück attributed to him but which has been rejected by Vey.¹⁴¹⁴G. Glück, Van Dyck: Des Meisters Gemälde, Klassiker der Kunst, 2nd revised ed., Stuttgart/New York/London 1931, p. 313 and Vey in S.J. Barnes, N. de Poorter, O. Millar and H. Vey, Anthony van Dyck: A Complete Catalogue of the Paintings, New Haven (Conn.)/London 2004, no. III.A29.

Gregory Martin, 2022

Vey in S.J. Barnes, N. de Poorter, O. Millar and H. Vey, Anthony van Dyck: A Complete Catalogue of the Paintings, New Haven (Conn.)/London 2004, no. III.73

1880, p. 501, no. 470a (as A. van der Borcht); 1887, p. 39, no. 306; 1903, p. 91, no. 854 (as François van der Borcht); 1904, p. 110, no. 854 (as François (?) van der Borcht); 1911, p. 128, no. 854 (with a view of Dover (?) castle); 1934, p. 90, no. 854 (dated c. 1628); 1960, p. 91, no. 854 (seascape possibly by A. van Ertvelt); 1976, p. 208, no. A 725 (as Portrait of a Man from the Van der Borcht family, perhaps François van der Borcht)

G. Martin, 2022, 'follower of Anthony van Dyck, Portrait of a Male Member of the Van der Borcht Family, c. 1635', in Flemish Paintings in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: hdl.handle.net/10934/RM0001.COLLECT.7001