The support is a lined, fine-weave canvas missing its original tacking edges, and probably consists of two strips joined vertically. The paint was applied very smoothly over a light-coloured ground. Some underdrawing is visible in the sitter’s right eye. Pentimenti reveal that the position of the sitter’s right hand and the book on the table were altered.

Fair. The background is severely abraded. The varnish is discoloured, unevenly applied and has crazed in the background.

Bifacial flat frames of ebonised conifer¹¹Van Thiel and Kloek in Amsterdam 1984b, pp. 150-51, no. 28; Van Thiel and Kloek in Van Thiel/De Bruyn Kops 1995, pp. 196-97, no. 28.

? Commissioned by Johan van Someren and Elisabeth Vervoorn; ? their daughter Clara van Someren (1654-1709); ? her son Jacob Tierens (1691-1760); ? his son Simon Tierens (1716-98); ? his son Seger Tierens (1749-94); ? his son Hendrik A.C. Tierens (1794-1851); ? his daughter Cornelia H.A. Tierens (1818-89); ? her daughter Cecilia G. Verhagen (1849-1934); her son Lieutenant-Colonel Marius C. van Houten, Doorn, Utrecht;²²Provenance reconstructed by R.E.O. Ekkart, 2004. by whom donated to the museum, 1933, but kept in usufruct;³³Note RMA. transferred to the museum, as attributed to Cornelis Janssens van Ceulen I, 1953

Object number: SK-A-3857

Credit line: Gift of M.C. van Houten, Doorn

The sitters in this pendant pair are identified by the labels on the back of the paintings, which probably date from the early 19th century. Johan van Someren, who was born in Dordrecht on 3 July 1622, was the alderman responsible for waterways in Dordrecht, and Dike-Reeve of Oud-Beijerland. In 1655 he became Pensionary of Nijmegen. He died in 1676 in his birthplace of Dordrecht. Elisabeth Vervoorn of Gorinchem, whom he married in 1648, was the second of his three wives. Both Van Someren and Vervoorn enjoyed some fame as poets.⁵⁵Scheltema 1823, pp. 138-43; Frederiks/Van den Branden 1887, p. 740.

Van Someren (shown here) and Vervoorn (see SK-A-3858) are shown half-length, seated against an indeterminate green-brown background. The pendants are still in their original frames.⁶⁶See Original framing. The hand of Cornelis Janssens van Ceulen I is mainly recognizable in the soft, melting outlines. These portraits, which are related to the one of Jan Cornelisz Geelvinck dated 1646,⁷⁷Amsterdams Historisch Museum. are among the most restrained works from the second half of the artist’s career. The attire is sober, there is no jewellery, and the sitters are in stilled poses. Van Someren has his right hand on his heart and his left hand on an open book, probably a Bible.⁸⁸See Salomonson 1990, p. 276, for this pose. Vervoorn has her hands crossed, unlike the elegant hands, some of them fingering their pearl necklaces and bracelets, in many other portraits by this artist.⁹⁹See, for example, the Portrait of Maria van Liere-Van Reygersbergen of 1651, Utrecht, Centraal Museum; illustrated in coll. cat. Utrecht 1999, II, p. 1021, no. 324.

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. 156.

Van Thiel and Kloek in Amsterdam 1984b, pp. 150-51, no. 28; Van Thiel and Kloek in Van Thiel/De Bruyn Kops 1995, no. 28

1976, p. 308, nos. A 3857, A 3858; 2007, no. 156

G. Wuestman, 2007, 'Cornelis (I) Jonson van Ceulen, Portrait of Johan van Someren (1622-76), 1650', in J. Bikker (ed.), Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth Century in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: https://data.rijksmuseum.nl/20028161