watermark: bunch of grapes, Strasbourg lily and a cross?

…; from J.H. Valk, Amsterdam (as Jan van Kessel), fl. 14, to the museum (L. 2228), 1889

Object number: RP-T-1889-A-1954

The present sheet came into the collection as a drawing by Jan van Kessel (1641-1680) and was later tentatively attributed to Cornelis Saftleven. Schulz questioned the latter attribution and suggested the drawing might instead have been made by Cornelis’s brother, Herman Saftleven (1609-1685).¹¹W. Schulz, Cornelis Saftleven (1607-1685): Leben und Werke, mit einem kritischen Katalog der Gemälde und Zeichnungen, Berlin 1978, p. 165. While the black chalk drawing does reveal similarities to Cornelis’s drawings in some areas, for example in the rendering of the birds with a few effective lines, the messy hatching in the lower half of the drawing is rather different. Furthermore, the washes differ from those used in autograph works, such as in Cornelis’s View in a Village (inv. no. RP-T-1888-A-1503) in the Rijksmuseum’s collection.

Carolyn Mensing, 2020

W. Schulz, Cornelis Saftleven (1607-1685): Leben und Werke, mit einem kritischen Katalog der Gemälde und Zeichnungen, Berlin 1978, p. 165 (as H. Saftleven?)