Portrait of a Man

1684

Peeter Leermans

oil on copper
35.5 x 30 cm
extremely faintly signed and dated in dark paint,
lower right corner: “Peeter Je An 1684”
Ple-100© 2017 The Leiden Collection

Portrait of a Man
Page 2 of 11

How To Cite
Jansen, Guido. "Portrait of a Man." In The Leiden Collection Catalogue. Edited by Arthur K. Wheelock Jr.
New York, 2017.
https://www.theleidencollection.com/archive/.
This page is available on the site's Archive. PDF of every version of this page is available on the Archive,
and the Archive is managed by a permanent URL. Archival copies will never be deleted. New versions areadded only when a substantive change to the narrative occurs.

© 2017 The Leiden Collection

Portrait of a Man
Page 3 of 11

This small work portrays a young man with blue eyes and long, wavy,

Comparative Figures

black hair sitting at dusk on a hillock before an imaginary wooded
landscape. His costly silk Japanese dressing gown is lined with dark red
satin, the same fabric as the cravat, which is tied around the sitter’s neckwith a lace cloth. Beneath the quilted dressing gown he wears a goldcolored waistcoat over a white linen shirt featuring cuffs richly trimmedwith lace. Numerous beautifully executed animals surround the man, whoplays with a small dog of a breed often seen in the works of Jan Steen(1625/26–79) and Frans van Mieris the Elder (1635–81): a kooikerhondje,
which resembles a spaniel. In the branches above its head we see agoshawk, several finches, and a hoopoe (Upupa epops), a bird no longer
found in the Netherlands, while on the ground, a salamander and a toad
climb the sandy mound. A distant view of a castle in the midst of highmountains is depicted at the right.

Fig 1. Peeter Leermans, Hermit,ca. 1670–75, oil on panel, 41.6 x
32.8 cm, Staatliche
Kunstsammlungen,Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister,
Dresden, Gal.Nr. 1779

This small copper painting was first documented at a sale in Brussels in
1769 (see Provenance), when it was in the company of its pendant, which
portrays a woman playing the guitar in the company of two other figures.
The people depicted in the pendant are undoubtedly this young man’s wifeand two of their children or other members of their family. It was not until
the 1821 sale that the companion pieces were separated; the painting of
the woman has not been seen since.
In 1946 the RKD (Netherlands Institute for Art History) in The Hague
acquired a black-and-white photograph of Portrait of a Man, then in
England in the possession of Edmund Treherne (1896–1958). A noteaccompanying the photograph says that the work is signed and dated“Peeter L… / 1684.” This appears to be the only time the artist signed withhis full given name, and though he has been referred to as Pieter

Fig 2. Peeter Leermans, The
Trumpeter and the Maidservant,1677, oil on copper, 30 x 25 cm,
Musée des Beaux-Arts, Rennes,
inv. 109, Photo © MBA, Rennes,
Dist RMN-Grand Palais / Patrick
Merret / © RMN-Grand Palais /Art Resource, NY

Leermans, this would indicate that Peeter is the appropriate spelling. Overtime, the signature gradually faded and now has disappeared altogether.
At the 1983 auction the work was still “signed and indistinctly dated,”
whereas at the 1992 sale it was no longer described as signed (seeProvenance). The date of 1684 is perfectly suited, in terms of style,to Portrait of a Man, in light of a number of closely related portraits by
Leermans that are known to be from the period 1681–84 and which leave
no doubt as to the dating of the present painting.[1]Nothing is known about the life of Peeter Leermans, apart from the fact

Fig 3. Peeter Leermans, MusicalParty on a Terrace, ca. 1680, oilon copper, 32 x 37 cm, Private
Collection, London© 2017 The Leiden Collection

Portrait of a Man
Page 4 of 11

that he acquired a certain reputation early on, for his name appears in a
select list—compiled by the Parisian connoisseur Dezallier d’Argenville(1680–1765)—of Dutch artists who were well known in France and whose
work was paid for in gold.[2] Despite being listed in the company ofRembrandt van Rijn (1606–69), Philips Wouwerman (1619–68), Gerrit
Dou (1613–75), Godefridus Schalcken (1643–1706), Jan van Huysum(1682–1749), and other painters who still enjoy international reputations,
Leermans is practically unknown today. Even so, he was already recorded
during his lifetime by André Félibien (1619–95) who, remarkably enough,mentions him in 1688 in the second volume of his Entretiens among thefollowers of Dou: “Skalque, Nesker, Lermans & Moër” (Schalcken,
Netscher, Leermans, and De Moor).[3] Shortly after this, Leermans again
had the honor of being mentioned in writing by the Paris art expert andpublisher Florent le Comte (died 1712), who in 1700 described Leermans
and Schalcken as fellow pupils in Dou’s studio.[4] There is no subsequentFig 4. Peeter Leermans, Portraitof Eugène Alexander von Thurnund Taxis (1652–1714), 1682, oilon copper, 29 x 22 cm, National
Museum of Wales, Cardiff,#NMW A37

record of Leermans, a fact remarked upon in a Paris sale catalogue of1814.[5] Not one document or archival record has ever surfaced that sheds
any light on this painter’s life,[6] so it is a mystery how 1655 and 1706 crept
into the art historical literature as the years of his birth and death.[7]We can, nonetheless, draw some conclusions about the artist from his
paintings, as he left a fairly consistent oeuvre of some thirty works, manyof which are dated. Around ten paintings on panel and copper bear dates
that range from 1670 to 1685. The period of his earliest artistic activity
therefore indicates that Leermans was not born in 1655 but some time in
the period 1640–45, which would in fact make him, as Le Comtesuggested, a contemporary of Schalcken. Leermans’s earliest known
work, dated 1670, is a genre piece depicting a girl cleaning fish, acomposition that is closely related to those produced in the same years by
Dou’s many pupils and followers.[8] Among the undated works are several
scenes with a praying hermit (fig 1) or a penitent Mary Magdalene which,given the obvious influence of Dou, may also be dated to that period,
namely the early 1670s.[9] It is possible, but by no means certain, that
Leermans was active in Leiden at that time.
In 1677 he painted, in a manner that is also characteristic of his later work,
one of his best genre pieces: an interior with a trumpeter making advances
on a maidservant who is scouring a kettle, all of which is observed by alaughing old woman in the background (fig 2). The two young and© 2017 The Leiden Collection

Portrait of a Man
Page 5 of 11

beautiful protagonists are painted in the supple, elegant style of Frans van
Mieris the Elder in his best years, with a beau fini that is considerably lesssharp and finished than what is seen in the previously mentioned scenes
inspired by Dou. The palette, too, is more harmonious and less harshly
colorful than in his earlier work.[10] Over the course of his career,
Leermans’s genre scenes become more rare, and he returned
progressively to portraits. Musical Party on a Terrace (fig 3) is one of hisbest genre pieces, and it is no coincidence that it bears the falsified
signature of Frans van Mieris, which was not yet present when Gustav
Waagen described the painting in 1854.[11]It may well prove possible to identify the members of the musical party on
the basis of the family arms that decorate the garden vase. In all likelihood
it will then become clear that the sitters were not natives of Leiden (or any
other city in Holland) but of the Southern Netherlands, as it is assumed
that Leermans moved to Brussels around 1680.[12] It was there, in 1682,
that he painted the portraits of Eugène Alexander von Thurn und Taxis(1652–1714) and, presumably, his mother, Anne Françoise van Horne (ca.
1630–93) (fig 4).[13] This prominent descendant of the imperial
postmaster’s family lived in a splendid mansion in Brussels with beautiful
gardens overlooking the Zavelkerk, in which the family had two ornate
funeral chapels built on either side of the choir in the second half of theseventeenth century. Only after the death in Brussels of his wife, Anna
Adelheid zu Fürstenberg (1659–1701), did Eugène Alexander, the firstprince in his family, transfer the headquarters of his business to Frankfurt
am Main, where a new Thurn und Taxis mansion was built.
Several more arguments support the theory that Leermans immigrated
around 1680 to the Southern Netherlands, probably to Brussels. Not asingle painting by his hand was sold at public auction in Holland before
1800,[14] whereas in this same period his work appeared in the Southern
Netherlands at no fewer than fourteen sales, in addition to seven auctionsin London and five in Paris.[15] The first documented painting by Leermans
was offered at a sale in Brussels in 1739, and shortly afterward another of
his works appeared at a 1741 auction in Antwerp.[16] A similar situation issuggested by the works on offer in the period 1800–50, when Leermans’s
paintings appeared more frequently at public auctions taking place in theSouthern Netherlands. It is also telling that the Hermit (see (fig 1)) in
Dresden, which was acquired by Augustus the Strong (1670–1733),© 2017 The Leiden Collection

Portrait of a Man
Page 6 of 11

Elector of Saxony and King of Poland, was offered to him in 1708, alongwith two other works by Leermans, by the Antwerp art dealer François
Lemmers.[17]The iconography and execution of some of Leermans’s paintings also
argue for his move to the Southern Netherlands. The Koninklijke Museavoor Schone Kunsten van België (Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium)in Brussels have a large Christ on the Cross painted on copper.[18]Hofstede de Groot already expressed his surprise at the style of this fully
signed work, which in his opinion bore no resemblance whatsoever to the
Dou-like works in Dresden and Rennes (see (fig 1) and (fig 2)). He evenwent so far as to call it a copy after Rubens.[19] When the same art
historian saw Saint Joseph and the Christ Child in Budapest, he noted:“Completely Catholic in conception and Flemish in its palette.”[20] It may be
expected of someone who immigrated to Brussels around 1680 that hewould conform, as regards style and iconography, to the prevailing tastesof the Southern Netherlands and make paintings in a Rubensian palette ofsubjects suited to the Counter Reformation.
In light of the above, we can finally hazard a guess as to the identity of theyoung sitter in Portrait of a Man; in all likelihood he is from the Southern
Netherlands, possibly from a Brussels family. The earliest known
provenance of this work is another clue, for the painting was first
documented, together with its pendant, at a sale held in that city in 1769.
Thus it is to be hoped that further archival research in Brussels will
eventually yield some biographical information on Peeter Leermans. His
oeuvre, too, certainly deserves closer investigation.[21]-Guido Jansen© 2017 The Leiden Collection

Portrait of a Man
Page 7 of 11

Endnotes
1. SeeBernhard

Schnackenburg,

Gemäldegalerie

Alte

Meister

Kassel:Gesamtkatalog (Mainz, 1996), 169, inv. GK 309, Portrait of a Huntsman, dated 1682, oil oncanvas, 55.5 x 46.5 cm. Also Portrait of a Gentleman, Aged 33 , dated 1683, which was
auctioned at Christie’s in London, 20 July 1990, lot 172, together with Portrait of a Cleric,
dated 1682, both oil on copper, 33.5 x 26 cm; illustrations in color. It should be noted,
however, that the master painted his last known portrait a year later, in 1685. This
was Portrait of a Lady and Child sold at Christie’s in London on 31 May 1946 as lot 92(support not recorded, 12½ x 9¼ inches); see RKD (Rijksbureau voor Kunsthistorische
Documentatie/Netherlands Institute for Art History) Databases, Excerpts, HdG-fiche
1276289. Moreover, Portrait of an Officer, in Armor , which was sold in London in 1908, issaid to have been dated 1692. This is probably an incorrect reading of “1682”; see RKD(Rijksbureau

voor

Kunsthistorische

Documentatie/Netherlands

Institute

for

Art

History) Databases, Excerpts, HdG-fiche 1276312.
2. Antoine-Joseph Dezallier d’Argenville, Abrégé de la vie des plus fameux peintres, avec
leurs portraits gravés en taille-douce, les indications de leurs principaux ouvrages,
quelques réflexions sur leurs caractères, et la maniere de connoître les desseins et les
tableaux des grands maîtres, 3 vols. (Paris, 1745–52), 3: IV–V.
3. André Félibien, Entretiens sur les vies et sur les ouvrages des plus excellents peintres
anciens et modernes, 5 vols. (Paris, 1666–88), 2:245.
4. Florent le Comte, Cabinet des singularitez d’architecture, peinture, sculpture, et graveure:
Ou introduction à la connaissance des plus beaux arts, figurés sous les tableaux, lesstatues et les estampes, 3 vols. (Brussels, 1702), 275: “Il laissa des Eléves qui suivirent samanière; entr’autres Scalque & Lermans” (He left behind pupils who pursued his manner:
Schalcken and Leermans, among others).
5. A signed portrait of a man dated 1684, which was sold at an auction held in Paris on 28–30
March 1814, is described in the catalogue as follows: “Un seul écrivain parle de P.
Léermans, et le met au-dessus des Peintres du même genre: cependant, comme ses
ouvrages, très-rares, sont peu connus” (The one author who mentions P. Leermans ranks
him above other painters of the same genre, even though his very rare works are little
known). RKD (Rijksbureau voor Kunsthistorische Documentatie/Netherlands Institute for Art
History) Databases, Excerpts, HdG-fiche 1276296.
6. For the purpose of this project, Piet Bakker combed the Leiden archives; he, too, was unable
to find a single document concerning Leermans.
7. These dates first appeared in the aforementioned Paris sale catalogue of March 1814, which
provides no justification or references to any sources. The sale catalogue (see note 5) gives:© 2017 The Leiden Collection

Portrait of a Man
Page 8 of 11“Leermans (P.) Ecole hollandaise. Né en 1655, mort en 1706” (Leermans [P.] Dutch school.
Born in 1655, died in 1706). In 1803 De Burtin still thought that the painter was Flemish:“Leeremans, Flamand”; François Xavier de Burtin, Catalogue de tableaux, vendus à
Bruxelles, depuis l’année 1773; avec les noms de maitres mis en ordre alphabetique, et ladésignation du sujet, de la grandeur et du prix de chaque piéce en argent de change, avec
l’extrait de la vie de chaque peintre (Brussels, 1803), 155. The source used by the Paris
auction house has not yet been found.
8. The painting last surfaced in an auction at Sotheby’s in London, 12 December 1990, lot 177(oil on panel, 37 x 29.5 cm). It also had a false “N. MAES 1657” signature and date. Around
1850 Gerrit Gruijter (1806–after 1880) copied the painting (as a work by Maes) inwatercolor; this sheet is preserved as part of the Fodor collection in the Amsterdams
Historisch Museum, inv. no. 403. Photographs of both works can be found at the RKD(Rijksbureau voor Kunsthistorische Documentatie/Netherlands Institute for Art History),group 562, Leermans box. An image of the watercolor can be found on RKD (Rijksbureauvoor Kunsthistorische Documentatie/Netherlands Institute for Art History) Databases,
Images, Kunstwerknummer 25431.
9. See, for example, the Praying Monk at a sale at Sotheby’s in London, 7 March 1979, lot 100(oil on panel, 24 x 18.5 cm), and the portrayals of Mary Magdalene that were sold at
Bukowski’s in Stockholm on 22 October 1952, lot 143 (oil on panel, 42 x 32.5 cm) andChristie’s in London on 28 April 2010, lot 108 as by Dou (oil on panel, 36.8 x 28 cm). The
RKD (Rijksbureau voor Kunsthistorische Documentatie/Netherlands Institute for Art History)
has photographs of all the works mentioned.
10. Commenting on the Allegory of Avarice (The Miserly Woman) in the Kunsthistorisches
Museum in Vienna, Hofstede de Groot noted: “Pijnlijk van uitvoering en hard en bont van
kleur als een Naiveu” (Painful in execution and as jarringly colorful as a Naiveu), referring toMatthis

Naiveu(1647–1721);

RKD(Rijksbureau

voor

Kunsthistorische

Documentatie/Netherlands Institute for Art History) Databases, Excerpts, HdG-fiche
1276301.
11. Arthur K. Wheelock Jr. and Christopher Brown, The Golden Age of Dutch and Flemish
Painting: The Edward and Sally Speelman Collection (Exh. cat. Houston, Museum of Fine
Arts) (Houston, 2000), no. 11; Gustav F. Waagen, Treasures of Art in Great Britain: Beingan Account of the Chief Collections of Paintings, Drawings, Sculptures, Illuminated Mss.,&c &c, 3 vols. (London, 1854), 2:253. He saw the painting in the collection of Frederick
Heusch (1809–70) in London.
12. In 1992 Rudi Ekkart confirmed the lack of any documents in which Leermans occurs (seealso note 6). He rightly doubted the attribution to Leermans of the Regents of the St.
Elizabeth Hospital, dated 1667, in Leiden’s Lakenhal (inv. no. 270), calling it “hypothetischen moeilijk te staven” (hypothetical and difficult to substantiate). He came to the conclusion© 2017 The Leiden Collection

Portrait of a Man
Page 9 of 11

that, in view of some of the sitters, it was “niet onwaarschijnlijk dat ook deze kunstenaar zijn
geluk in Duitsland heeft gezocht” (not unlikely that this artist, too, sought his fortune inGermany). The “German” sitters lived in Brussels, however; see R. E. O. Ekkart, “Leidse
burgers in beeld,” in Theodoor Herman Lunsingh Scheurleer, C. Willemijn Fock, and A. J.
van Dissel, Het Rapenburg: Geschiedenis van een Leidse gracht , 6 vols. (Leiden,
1986–92), 6:3–39, esp. 29 and 38 n. 132. We know, at any rate, two identical versions of a
Portrait of the Great Elector, Friedrich Wilhelm I of Brandenburg (1620–1688), as a Knightof the Golden Fleece, both of which are signed and dated 1681 by Leermans. Given therather puffed-up appearance of the elector’s face, Leermans must have worked from anengraving, probably a mezzotint. One version (oil on copper, 35 x 28.7 cm) is reproduced inWalther Bernt, Die Niederländischen Maler des 17. Jahrhunderts, 4 vols. (Munich,
1948–62), 4:166, and is to be found in the Jakob Briner Foundation, Museum Briner undKern, Winterthur, Switzerland (inv. 58); the other specimen was to be found in 1963 in thecollection of Count Thierry de Limburg Stirum, Huldenberg, Belgium (photo RKD(Rijksbureau voor Kunsthistorische Documentatie/Netherlands Institute for Art History)). The
RKD’s website (Databases, Images, Kunstwerknummer 131004) reproduces the painting in
Switzerland, but the identification and whereabouts it gives are incorrect.
13. David Dilwyn John, National Museum of Wales: Catalogue of Oil-Paintings (Cardiff, 1955),
148, nos. 715 and 716. Unfortunately, both paintings are in a poor state of preservation. The
pendant of the woman (oil on panel, 29 x 23 cm, inv. no. A38) has been identified, on thebasis of a later inscription, as the mother of Eugène Alexander, Anne Françoise van Horne(ca. 1630–93). It is possible, however, that it portrays his wife, who was also named Anna.
14. With one exception, albeit a painting that was wrongly sold as a work by “P. Leermans” withthe collection of J. Danser Nyman on 16 August 1798 in Amsterdam (lot 158); RKD(Rijksbureau voor Kunsthistorische Documentatie/Netherlands Institute for Art History)
Databases, Excerpts, HdG-fiche 1276300. The work has been identified as Nicolaes Maes’s
Hurdy-Gurdy Player, now in Dordrecht, inv. no. DM/948/119 (on loan from the Rijksdienst
voor het Cultureel Erfgoed [Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands], inv. no. NK 2445).
15. This sum is a combination of the auction excerpts present at the RKD (Rijksbureau voor
Kunsthistorische Documentatie/Netherlands Institute for Art History), the so-called Hofstede
de Groot index cards, and what the Getty Provenance Index gives for Leermans. Since
December 2011 the cards can also be consulted online via RKD (Rijksbureau voor
Kunsthistorische Documentatie/Netherlands Institute for Art History) Databases, Excerpts.
16. RKD (Rijksbureau voor Kunsthistorische Documentatie/Netherlands Institute for Art
History) Databases, HdG-fiche 1276285 for the sale in Brussels on 20 July 1739 and card
1276282 for a work from the collection of Jacomo de Wit, which was offered at a sale on 15
May 1741 in Antwerp as the following: “Eenen Hermeyt met veel bywerck door Leirmans, inde goestinge van G. Dauw, seer delicaat” (A hermit with many accessories by Leermans, in© 2017 The Leiden Collection

Portrait of a Man
Page 10 of 11

the manner of G. Dou, very delicate).
17. The other two pieces were sold before 1722; Annegret Laabs, “‘Une fille et un Cupido vonRembrandt’: Die Gemäldeankäufe Augusts des Starken in Antwerpen 1708 und 1709,”
Dresdener Kunstblätter 45 (2001): 19.
18. Henri Pauwels et al., Koninklijke Musea voor Schone Kunsten van België, Departement
Oude Kunst, inventariscatalogus van de oude schilderkunst (Brussels, 1984), 172, inv. 604
with illustration (signed, oil on copper, 64.5 x 39.5 cm).
19. RKD (Rijksbureau voor Kunsthistorische Documentatie/Netherlands Institute for Art History)
Databases, Excerpts, HdG-fiche 1276274.
20. “Geheel en al katholiek van opvatting en navolging der Vlamen in het coloriet.” RKD(Rijksbureau voor Kunsthistorische Documentatie/Netherlands Institute for Art History)
Databases, Excerpts, HdG-fiche 1276275; for the painting, see Ildikó Ember and Zsuzsa
Urbach, Museum of Fine Arts Budapest: Old Master’s Gallery; Summary Catalogue , vol.
2, Early Netherlandish, Dutch and Flemish Painting (Budapest, 2000), 94, inv. no. 343 (oilon copper, 91.5 x 69 cm).
21. For instance, Leermans is still completely unknown as a painter of portrait miniatures. In my
opinion, Portrait of a Lady in the Städel Museum in Frankfurt (inv. no. 458), which Mirjam
Neumeister has attributed to Arie de Vois, is by the hand of Leermans; Mirjam Neumeister,
Holländische Gemälde im Städel Museum 1550–1800 (Petersberg, 2010), 515–20. Portraitof a Young Lady in a Blue Dress , likewise reproduced in that volume, should also be
ascribed to Leermans; Mirjam Neumeister, Holländische Gemälde im Städel Museum
1550–1800 (Petersberg, 2010), 518 (fig. 573). For quite some time this exquisite portrait has
been with the Paris art dealer Claude Vittet who, in 2012, offered it on his website as a workby Constantijn Netscher.

Provenance(Sale, Krafft, Brussels, 26 June 1769, no. 11, the same lot includes its pendant) [72 francs].
J. B. van den Branden (his sale, Collaer, Brussels, 13 April 1801, no. 7, the same lot
includes its pendant) [82 francs to Marnef].
De Marneffe (his sale, Brussels, 16 May 1809, no. 111) [86 francs to Renders].
Cornellis Louis Reijnders (his sale, Nieuwenhuys and De Man, Brussels, 6 August 1821, no.
58) [26 francs to Coor].
E. A. Treherne, Hollow Hill, Ditchingham, Suffolk, England, 1945–47.
(Sale, Bonhams, London, 21 April 1983, no. 35; sale, Kunsthaus Lempertz, Cologne, 21© 2017 The Leiden CollectionPowered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

Portrait of a Man
Page 11 of 11

May 1992, no. 83, not sold; sale, Auktionhaus Kaupp, Sulzburg, 25 September 2004, no.
2215, not sold [Johnny van Haeften Ltd, London, 2004]).
From whom acquired by the present owner in 2004.

Technical Summary
The support, a rectangular copper sheet, has substantial weight and does not flex when handled.
The panel’s thickness tapers slightly, and there are no hammer marks, which suggests the panel
has been rolled. A burr along the reverse of the left edge and incisions along the front surface of
the upper and left edges suggest the support was trimmed before the painting was executed.
Fine hand-drawn black lines applied over brown and black oxidation layers form a rectangularborder along the outer edges of the panel reverse. A numerical inscription, white chalk, andindications of the previous location of four labels are located along the panel reverse, but there
are no wax seals, stencils, or maker’s marks.
Fine scratches give tooth to the front surface of the support. No ground is readily visible. The
paint has been smoothly applied with extremely fine modeling through the figure’s flesh tones,
hair, and brown background, and with delicate dabs of raised impasto through the foliage andbrocade.
The painting is extremely faintly signed and dated in dark paint along the lower right corner.
No underdrawing or compositonal changes are readily apparent in infrared images captured at
780–1000 nanometers.
The painting was cleaned and restored in 2005 and remains in a good state of preservation.

Technical Summary Endnotes© 2017 The Leiden Collection