watermark: foolscap with five points, above three balls (lower part)

…; donated from the estate of Jacob Olie (1834-1905), Amsterdam, by his daughter Aagje Olie (1884-1975), Utrecht (as ‘Willem or Daniël Schellinks’), with 16 other drawings, to the museum (L. 2228), 1972

Object number: RP-T-1972-17

Credit line: Gift of A. Olie, Utrecht

Based on the monogram ‘W.S.’, this drawing was previously catalogued as by Willem Schellinks (1623-1678). However, that monogram (in a different medium) in all likelihood was added by another hand. Schellinks is not known to have worked in red chalk, nor treated subject-matter such as a sleeping girl exposing her breasts.

What remained unnoticed until recently is the fact that the figure corresponds, in reverse, to one in the painting by Jan Baptist Weenix. Sleeping Tambouret Player with a Dog, dated 1656, in the Alte Pinakothek, Munich (inv. no. 869).¹¹M. Dekiert, Alte Pinakothek: Holländische und deutsche Malerei des 17. Jahrhunderts, coll. cat. Munich 2006 (Katalog der ausgestellten Werke, vol. 4), p. 226; A.A. van Wagenberg-ter Hoeven, Jan Baptist Weenix and Jan Weenix: The Paintings, 2 vols., Zwolle 2018, I, no. 97. The figure in the picture is dressed in the same manner, with open bodice, her head fallen back and with one arm resting on a block of stone. The drawing differs in a few details: the girl’s legs are crossed, her right arm is bent and her hair is partly covered by a scarf. Given these differences, the drawing is unlikely to be a copy after the painting. Instead, it should be considered as a preliminary study for the painted figure. As Schatborn observed, Weenix’s rare figure studies served as a stock of motifs for development in painted figures.²²P. Schatborn, Dutch Figure Drawings from the Seventeenth Century, exh. cat. Amsterdam (Rijksprentenkabinet)/Washington (DC) (National Gallery of Art) 1981-82, p. 69. Another figure study accepted as by Weenix, the museum’s inv. no. RP-T-1899-A-4239, features similar swift and flowing contours, combined with short, energetically applied accents. In both drawings, soft, broad hatching is paired with light, thin lines. Moreover, red chalk was a favourite medium with Jan Baptist Weenix. The present proposed reattribution was accepted by Anke van Wagenberg-ter Hoeven,³³Kindly communicated via email, 19 February 2017 and subsequently included in her monograph the following year. with only the question remaining who – and for what reason – added the monogram ‘W.S.’

The figure in Weenix’s painting – or even the present drawing – might have been known to Jan Steen (c. 1625/26-1679). His figure of Lea in his painting Jacob Confronting Laban (c. 1669) in the Norton Simon Foundation, Pasadena, CA (inv. no. F.1969.10.1.P.),⁴⁴W.T. Kloek, ‘Jan Steen, zijn motievenschat en het historiestuk’, in A. van Suchtelen (ed.), Jan Steen en de historieschilderkunst, exh. cat. The Hague (Mauritshuis) 2018, p. 33 (fig. 11). largely echoes the present figure in reverse. Such borrowing would be in line with Steen’s regular habit of basing his figures on the inventions of colleagues.⁵⁵On this practice, cf. W.T. Kloek, ‘Jan Steen, zijn motievenschat en het historiestuk’, in ibid., pp. 40-44.

Annemarie Stefes, 2018

A.A. van Wagenberg-ter Hoeven, Jan Baptist Weenix and Jan Weenix: The Paintings, 2 vols., Zwolle 2018, I, p. 216

A. Stefes, 2018, 'Willem Schellinks, Seated Woman in a Lascivious Pose, in or before c. 1656 - 1656', in J. Turner (ed.), (under construction) Drawings 2, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: https://data.rijksmuseum.nl/200144319