Jan Woutersz Stap

The Landlord’s Steward

c. 1636

Inscriptions

  • inscription, centre bottom, on the document held by the landlord’s steward:hebbe twee morgenlant / soodat ick de 8esten tot drie / deselven pieter clasen souden / ende dat comenden april 1636 / pieter Janssen als getuigen / souden mijnheer iaspersen / met een weniche daer bij / op sulcken condisy souden / toecomende meij de vertien / In mijn handen geven daer / soodat ick soude ... / met schone woorden in / ende ick hebbe hem / ende nu en wil heij niet / voor tweer Jaerren / Bij mij p. / clasen / openbaer not.

Technical notes

The support consists of three vertically grained oak planks. Bevels are present at the top and bottom and only slightly on the sides. The thin, light-coloured ground layer appears orange where the wood of the panel shows through. Brushmarking is apparent throughout. Changes visible as pentimenti include the steward’s right hand which originally had a thumb, and the book behind the young boy, which was larger. Other changes have been discerned with infrared photography: the man on the right was placed closer to the middle of the composition and the steward wore a small cap instead of his present headgear.

Scientific examination and reports

  • technical report: W. de Ridder, RMA, 24 februari 2003

Condition

Fair. The hands and shadow areas are abraded. In paintings at the panel joins, the hands and the rooster have discoloured, as have the varnish layers.

Provenance

...; ‘painted and found in Antwerp in 1740’, 222 gns to Mr. ?;1Label on the reverse of the panel. in a ‘collection of curiosities in 1780 for 75 guineas’;2Label on the reverse of the panel....; donated to the museum by H.J. Pfungst (London), April 1910

ObjectNumber: SK-A-2426

Credit line: Gift of H.J. Pfungst, London

The artist

Biography

Jan Woutersz Stap (Amsterdam 1599 - ? Amsterdam c. 1663)

Although it was known that Johannes Woutersz was born in 1599, scholars hesitated in identifying him as one of the two children with this name baptized in the Nieuwe Kerk in Amsterdam in that year. The painter, however, is undoubtedly the Johannes Woutersz baptized on 22 July 1599,3GAA, DTB, no. 38, p. 744. as his mother, Altje Thijssen, is later repeatedly documented as godmother to his children.4See, for example, the baptismal records for Stap’s children, Marija, Wouter and Petrus; GAA, DTB, no. 6, p. 64, 12 November 1623 (Oude Kerk), no. 6, p. 231, 22 February 1629 (Oude Kerk), no. 41, p. 123, 16 February 1631 (Nieuwe Kerk). Stap’s father, Wouter Jansen, was a bricklayer. In 1622, the painter married Barbara Andriesdr. Around 1630 he began using the surname Stap, with which he also signed some of his paintings. The source for the February 1663 date of his death, recorded in the literature, has not been traced.

Stap’s earliest dated painting is a Landlord’s Steward of 1614.5Schleissheim, Bayerische Staatsgemäldesammlungen; illustrated in Van Schendel 1937, p. 278, fig. 11. In addition to such genre paintings, Stap also painted biblical scenes. It is not known with whom he trained, and his retrograde style, especially apparent in his genre paintings, has made it difficult to attach him to any early 17th-century school. Blankert has associated his archaism with that of Hendrick ter Brugghen. It is significant, therefore, that Stap’s Pilate Washing his Hands6Present whereabouts unknown; illustrated in Van Schendel 1937, p. 270, fig. 1. was modelled after Ter Brugghen’s painting of this theme.7Ter Brugghen’s painting is preserved only by way of a copy; Kassel, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister; illustrated in coll. cat. Kassel 1996, II, pl. 98, no. GK 589.

Jonathan Bikker, 2007

References
De Vries 1886, p. 301; Bredius 1935b, p. 48; Van Schendel 1937, pp. 269-72; Van Schendel in Thieme/Becker XXXVI, 1947, p. 262; Blankert 1986, p. 28

Entry

An 18th-century label on the back of the panel mistakenly records that it was executed in about ‘1545/1550’, and until the beginning of the 20th century this and other, similar works by Stap were considered to be the products of Quinten Massijs’s circle.8See, for example, Winkler 1924, p. 380. The artist, Johannes Woutersz Stap, was incorrectly identified with a painter named Jan Woutersz from Oudewater who acquired Amsterdam citizenship on 11 September 1542.9This mistaken identification was made by N. de Roever and published in coll. cat. 1887, p. 193. It was the discovery of the 1636 date on the document held by the notary in the present painting that led to the realization that Stap was a 17th-century artist who made pastiches of paintings executed almost a hundred years earlier.10Van Schendel 1937, p. 270.

Notaries, money-changers and landlords in their offices were subjects frequently depicted by Stap, for which a painting from 1539 attributed to Jan Massijs apparently served as the model.11Attributed to Jan Massijs, The Landlord’s Steward, 1539. Oil on panel, 85 x 115 cm. Dresden, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen, Gemäldegalerie. As first pointed out by Van Schendel 1937, p. 275. Unlike Stap’s other painting in the Rijksmuseum (SK-A-1341), The Landlord’s Steward has a vertical format. Common to both representations, as well as other works by Stap, are the 16th-century costumes, the emphasis on gestures, and the placement of the young boy in the right foreground. As in the present painting, the young boy is most often shown holding a rooster, an animal that also appears in the painting attributed to Jan Massijs.

The date 1539 is recorded in the open book in front of the notary in the painting attributed to Massijs. Stap used the same trick in the document held by the landlord’s steward in the Rijksmuseum work. This document is folded in half, but enough of it is legible to determine that the man standing before the steward is a tenant farmer who has leased a piece of land (‘twee morgenlant’) from ‘my lord Jaspersen’ (‘mijnheer jaspersen’). A certain Pieter Janssen was witness to the transaction, and the signature of the notary, whose full name is given in the text as Pieter Clasen, is found at the bottom of the document.12The name of the notary was incorrectly read by Van Schendel (1937, p. 274) as ‘P. Vlasch’. The document in the painting attributed to Jan Massijs also concerns the leasing of land. Like the tenant farmer in the older painting, Stap’s is clean-shaven, wears a similar costume and holds his hat to his chest. However, his serious, worrisome expression is quite different from the grimacing features of his older counterpart. Stap’s steward is a more noble variant of the one in the painting of 1539, and his child has a very earnest expression. In general, Stap has replaced the satire in the painting attributed to Jan Massijs with a sentimental seriousness.

Jonathan Bikker, 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. 276.

Literature

Van Schendel 1937, pp. 270, 274, no. 11

Collection catalogues

1920, p. 465, no. 2702a; 1934, p. 323, no. 2702a; 1960, p. 346, no. 2702; 1976, p. 614, no. A 2426; 2007, no. 276

Citation

J. Bikker, 2007, 'Jan Woutersz. Stap, The Landlord’s Steward, c. 1636', in J. Bikker (ed.), Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth Century in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: hdl.handle.net/10934/RM0001.COLLECT.6590

(accessed 18 July 2025 15:24:53).

Footnotes

  • 1Label on the reverse of the panel.
  • 2Label on the reverse of the panel.
  • 3GAA, DTB, no. 38, p. 744.
  • 4See, for example, the baptismal records for Stap’s children, Marija, Wouter and Petrus; GAA, DTB, no. 6, p. 64, 12 November 1623 (Oude Kerk), no. 6, p. 231, 22 February 1629 (Oude Kerk), no. 41, p. 123, 16 February 1631 (Nieuwe Kerk).
  • 5Schleissheim, Bayerische Staatsgemäldesammlungen; illustrated in Van Schendel 1937, p. 278, fig. 11.
  • 6Present whereabouts unknown; illustrated in Van Schendel 1937, p. 270, fig. 1.
  • 7Ter Brugghen’s painting is preserved only by way of a copy; Kassel, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister; illustrated in coll. cat. Kassel 1996, II, pl. 98, no. GK 589.
  • 8See, for example, Winkler 1924, p. 380.
  • 9This mistaken identification was made by N. de Roever and published in coll. cat. 1887, p. 193.
  • 10Van Schendel 1937, p. 270.
  • 11Attributed to Jan Massijs, The Landlord’s Steward, 1539. Oil on panel, 85 x 115 cm. Dresden, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen, Gemäldegalerie. As first pointed out by Van Schendel 1937, p. 275.
  • 12The name of the notary was incorrectly read by Van Schendel (1937, p. 274) as ‘P. Vlasch’.