watermark: none

…; sale, Samuel van Huls (1655-1734, The Hague), The Hague (J. Swart), 14 May 1736 sqq., Portfolio BB, no. 1581 (‘[Romein de Hooghe] Un Dieu de Rivière, & 4 autres’); ...; ? sale, Hendrik Verdonk (?-?, Rotterdam) et al., Rotterdam (Van Ryp), 30 September 1811 sqq., Album O, no. 49 (‘E_en Riviergod, met eenige Waternimphen. Met dito [in’t bruin gewasschen] door R. de Hooge_’), with two other drawings, fl. 10;¹¹RKD excerpts; not in art sales catalogues, copy RKD ...; from the dealer H.J. Hilm, Amsterdam, fl. 30, to the museum (L. 2228), with support from the F.G. Wallerfonds (L. 2760), 1942 [inventoried as ‘Romeyn de Hooghe?’]

Object number: RP-T-1942-8

Credit line: Purchased with the support of the F.G. Waller-Fonds

Romeyn de Hooghe made the present sheet – a rare example of an absolutely secure preliminary drawing by the artist – as a design for the title of the first book of De Ystroom (Amsterdam, 1671), a poem by Joannes Antonides van der Goes (1647-1684) describing a walk along the Amsterdam canals and the River IJ.²²Cf. H. Leeflang, ‘Waarheid, vlugheid en inventie. Ontwerp en uitvoering van de etsen’, in H. van Nierop (ed.), Romeyn de Hooghe. De verbeelding van de late Gouden Eeuw, Zwolle 2008, p. 129. The artist blocked in the underlying composition in red chalk, later rendering individual elements in a swift, sketchy manner in pen and brown ink. In a third step, he used brush and wash to indicate volume, light and shade.

The composition centres around the allegorical figure of the River IJ, represented by a river god. According to Antonides van der Goes, he is vomiting slime that is collected by the personification of the ‘Walls of Amsterdam’ (‘Muur van Amsterdam’), in the left foreground. In doing so, Pampus shallows are created, in the then Zuiderzee north-east of Amsterdam.³³Antonides van der Goes 1671, fol. ***4 verso: ‘Vestingboukonst, en de Muur van Amsterdam / Omvatten 't Y, vermoeit van slijm en veen te braeken; / Waer uit het week moeras op Pampus oorsprong nam.’ Pampus is now an artificial island with a late nineteenth-century fortification. The River IJ is supported by the ‘Art of Fortification’ (‘Vestingboukonst’) and accompanied by further personifications: ‘Vigilance’ (‘Wakkerheid’), bearing a crown and holding a staff with a single wing, who is comforting ‘Seafaring’ (‘Zeevaert’), crowned with a three-master. In the left foreground, behind ‘Walls of Amsterdam’, ‘Indefatigable Art’ (‘d’onvermoeide konst’) is represented, her head covered by a watermill, her three breasts ready to give life to the artists.⁴⁴Antonides van der Goes 1671, fol. ***4 verso: ‘Maer d'onvermoeide konst [... / Toont, hoe geen werktuig haer, dat schuuring maekt, ontbreekt. / De moddermolen dekt haer hooft, drie borsten zwellen / Van eeuwighvloeiend zogh, dat konstenaeren queekt.’]

In the corresponding print, in reverse (e.g. inv. no. RP-P-1965-175),⁵⁵The plate measures the 174 x 131 mm, but in view of the trimmed inscription at the drawing’s left border, the drawing was presumably originally somewhat larger. the basic motifs correspond, but De Hooghe also changed a number of details. ‘Art of Fortification’ is now wearing a crown of fortification walls encircling the Amsterdam town hall. ‘Seafaring’ no longer wears a three-master on her head, but a crown built of several hulls put together. ‘Vigilance’ is holding a staff with the all-seeing eye. More changes were done to the background details. In the drawing, only two figures are recognizable, being a reclining river god next to Neptune with his tripod. The remaining figures are rudimentary but can be identified thanks to the etching and Antonides van der Goes’s poem. The river god is the Amstel, trying to shriek back from Neptune who is pressing the Amsterdam Stock Exchange Building in his lap,⁶⁶Antonides van der Goes 1671, fol. ***4 verso: ‘Den god des Aemstels ziet men verder zich ontstellen, / En weigren 't Beursgewelv te draegen op zijn hart, / Dat van Neptuin met kracht gedrukt wort op zijn lenden.’ alluding to the dominance of the sea over the river.⁷⁷Cf. H. Leeflang, ‘Waarheid, vlugheid en inventie. Ontwerp en uitvoering van de etsen’, in H. van Nierop (ed.), Romeyn de Hooghe. De verbeelding van de late Gouden Eeuw, Zwolle 2008, p. 130. This is underscored by Thetis, in the background of the etching, who is pouring out gold from a cornucopia and thus driving the Amstel Nymphs away.⁸⁸Antonides van der Goes 1671, fol. ***4 verso: ‘Vrouw Thetys drijft met gelt uit haeren rijken hooren / De Nimfen op de vlucht. Above, Mercury hands a ship, bearing the old arms of Amsterdam, to Ganymede and Minerva, to replace the sign of Argo among the stars.

Although executed early in De Hooghe’s career, the present sheet, as Leeflang stated, is a fine example for the idea ‘ut pictura poesis’, of creating imagery in the visual arts not only inspired by poetry but on a par with it.⁹⁹H. Leeflang, ‘Waarheid, vlugheid en inventie. Ontwerp en uitvoering van de etsen’, in H. van Nierop (ed.), Romeyn de Hooghe. De verbeelding van de late Gouden Eeuw, Zwolle 2008, p. 131. Unfortunately, the inscription at the right border is partially trimmed, its content obscure so far.

Annemarie Stefes, 2019

D.C. Roëll, Aanwinsten, 1940-1946. Tentoonstelling van schilderijen, beeldhouwkunst, meubelen, kunstnijverheid, teekeningen en prenten, verworven in de jaren 1940-1946, exh. cat. Amsterdam (Rijksmuseum) 1946-47, no. 71; W.H. Wilson, The Art of Romeyn de Hooghe: An Atlas of European Late Baroque Culture, 3 vols., Cambridge (MA) 1974 (PhD diss., Harvard University), II, pp. 349-50, no. 4 (fig. 250); M.J.C. Otten, ‘Biografie van Romeyn de Hooghe’, De Boekenwereld 5 (1988), pp. 22-23; H. Leeflang, ‘Waarheid, vlugheid en inventie. Ontwerp en uitvoering van de etsen’, in H. van Nierop (ed.), Romeyn de Hooghe. De verbeelding van de late Gouden Eeuw, Zwolle 2008, pp. 129-31, 136-37 (fig. 3)

A. Stefes, 2019, 'Romeyn de Hooghe, Allegory of the River IJ, Amsterdam, c. 1671', in J. Turner (ed.), (under construction) Drawings 2, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: https://data.rijksmuseum.nl/200140472