Angel Appearing to Elijah

ca. 1642

Ferdinand Bol(Dordrecht 1616 – 1680 Amsterdam)oil on canvas
162.6 x 177.8 cm
FB-104Currently on view at: The National Museum ofChina, Beijing

How To Cite
Schatborn, Peter. "Angel Appearing to Elijah." In The Leiden Collection Catalogue. Edited by Arthur K.
Wheelock Jr. New York, 2017.
https://www.theleidencollection.com/archive/.
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© 2017 The Leiden Collection

Angel Appearing to Elijah
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This extremely powerful and well-preserved painting, which was unknown

Comparative Figures

until 2007 when it appeared at auction, is a prime example of Ferdinand
Bol’s early biblical representations. Executed soon after his apprenticeshipwith Rembrandt van Rijn (1606–69), Angel Appearing to Elijah is boldly
executed with a tonal color scheme that lends the composition great unity.
The painting depicts an episode from the Old Testament (I Kings
16:29–34 and chapters 17–19). In this complex and rather gory story,
Ahab, the king of Israel (reigned ca. 874–53 BC), and his wife, Jezebel,
reject the God of the Israelites and build an altar for the worshippers ofBaal. The prophet Elijah then challenges the priests of Baal to set up asacrificial altar to rival his own. When only Elijah’s sacrifice is consumed
by fire, the people reject the false god, Baal, and turn again to the God of
the Israelites. At Elijah’s instigation, the people then seize the prophets of

Fig 1. Ferdinand Bol, Jacob’s
Dream, ca. 1642, oil on canvas,
128.5 x 97 cm, Gemäldegalerie,
Dresden, Gal.-Nr. 1604

Baal, and Elijah kills them. After Jezebel subsequently threatens to kill
Elijah, the prophet flees into the wilderness where he sits under a juniper
tree and prays for death before falling asleep. The moment that Bol depicts
is when an angel comes to Elijah and says: “Arise and eat.” Elijah eats anddrinks, but then he falls asleep again, whereupon the angel returns andexhorts him once more to get up and eat. Thus fortified, Elijah “went in thestrength of that food forty days and forty nights unto Horeb the mount ofGod.”

Fig 2. Ferdinand Bol, Judah andTamar, 1644, oil on canvas, 123.2
x 172.4 cm, Museum of Fine Arts,
Boston, 17.3268

In Bol’s painting the figures loom large in the picture plane. Elijah, lying
under a tree, supports his head with his right hand and rests his left arm on
the ground. In his lap is the end of the belt tied around his waist, a motif
often seen in portrayals of biblical figures by, among others, Pieter
Lastman (1583–1633) and Rembrandt.[1] Behind Elijah hangs a gourd,
while leaves and flowers fill the right foreground. The approaching angel
looks at Elijah with slightly raised eyebrows as he prepares to waken theprophet with his raised left hand and provide him with water from the flask
hanging from his right hand. Light falling onto Elijah’s face and hands andFig 3. Ferdinand Bol, Elijah
Resting under a Tree, ca. 1642,
pen and brown ink, 85 x 115 mm,
Frits Lugt Collection, Fondation
Custodia, Paris, inv. 2520

onto the hair of the angel lends plasticity to their forms and anchors themfirmly in the darkened landscape surrounding them.
The painting likely dates around 1642, as Sumowski has proposed. Herightly compared this work to Bol’s Jacob’s Dream in Dresden, which also
depicts an angel appearing with a sleeping figure (fig 1).[2] Bol gained his
fascination with Old Testament scenes that stressed God’s spiritual© 2017 The Leiden Collection

Angel Appearing to Elijah
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guidance in the interactions of a young, golden-haired angel in a white,flowing robe with an aged bearded patriarch from Rembrandt, particularly
from the master’s compelling Sacrifice of Isaac.[3] Bol made otherpaintings depicting an angel and a biblical figure in the early 1640s thatare similar in composition, including Gideon and the Angel of
1640/41[4] and Hagar and the Angel, ca. 1650.[5] The free and confident
brushwork of the Leiden Collection painting, as well as its large-scale
figures, also relate to Bol’s Judah and Tamar of 1644 in Boston (fig2)[6] and his David’s Dying Charge to Solomon in Dublin, 1643.[7]The Frits Lugt Collection, Fondation Custodia, in Paris has a preliminary
drawing of this composition depicting Elijah (fig 3). The sheet waspreviously ascribed to Rembrandt,[8] but Martin Royalton-Kisch called that
attribution into question in 1992.[9] Schatborn subsequently assigned thedrawing to Bol, noting that Elijah’s pose and clothing correspond to thosein the painting.[10] At the lower left of the drawing is a partial left hand that
could be that of the angel, even though in the painting it appears in adifferent position.
Lugt, who believed that Rembrandt executed the drawing, dated it to ca.
1635, and Otto Benesch, who concurred with that attribution, dated it toca. 1638.[11] Nevertheless, a date to the early 1640s is appropriate for Bol,for he continued to make rather sketchy, Rembrandtesque drawings after
he left the master’s workshop, particularly when they were preliminary
studies for subject paintings.[12] Indeed, a passage from Samuel van
Hoogstraten’s Introduction to the High School of the Art of Painting , 1678,
reveals that Rembrandt’s pupils were expected to work for a long time in
the master’s style. Hoogstraten, who had studied with Rembrandt in the1640s, wrote: “You pupils must obey your master, and entrust youreducation to him. He who wishes to learn from his master’s lips must follow
him without question, until such time as he properly and correctly
understands what has been taught.” He goes on to say, “Therefore I
should rather impose five years of silence on pupils and recommend
constructive obedience . . . so that they first learn thoroughly to apply what
is recommended to them.”[13] Elijah Resting under a Tree corresponds inseveral respects to other Rembrandtesque drawings Bol made at thistime, such as David on His Deathbed in Besançon,[14] a preparatory
drawing for the above mentioned David’s Dying Charge to Solomon in
Dublin, 1643, and the drawing of Two Marys in Kraków,[15] which is© 2017 The Leiden Collection

Angel Appearing to Elijah
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probably a study for The Three Marys at the Tomb , 1644, now in
Copenhagen.[16]Elijah is often seen as a prefiguration of Christ, which may explain why thissubject appealed to Dutch patrons.[17] Just who these patrons may havebeen is an intriguing question since in the seventeenth century there waspractically no difference in the way the various religious denominations
viewed the iconography of different biblical themes. Apart from portrait
commissions and works ordered by civic authorities, such as those madefor the Amsterdam Town Hall, little is known about the patrons who
commissioned biblical scenes.[18] Manuth, however, has posited that thetheme of Elijah, owing to his prophecies and his role as a harbinger of the
Messiah, was of particular importance in the Jewish faith.[19] Elijah wasconsidered the protector of the oppressed and persecuted people of Israel.
The inventories of art in the collections of Jewish burghers in theseventeenth century also reveal a preference for subjects that include
Elijah.[20]Around 1650 Bol painted another depiction of the angel appearing toElijah, which differs from the present work in the way light falls on the
figures, and in the detailed depiction of the foliage.[21] The only other
Rembrandt pupil to paint this subject was Govaert Flinck (1615–60), who
did so in the early 1640s, although the lack of specific dates make it
impossible to know which artist depicted the subject first.[22] Interestingly,
the theme of Elijah and the Angel does not occur in Rembrandt’s painted
and etched oeuvre, and he only turned to it in a drawing of the early 1650s(Frits Lugt Collection, Fondation Custodia, Paris).[23] Several drawings that
Sumowski assigned to Bol portray the same subject, but their attribution toBol seems uncertain, even though they fit stylistically into the artist’s
circle.[24] Moreover, Cornelis Bisschop (1630–74), one of Bol’s pupils,
made a painting[25] and a drawing [26] inspired by his teacher’s work,
thereby testifying to this painting’s importance as a model for artists inBol’s orbit.
The painting was apparently once in the collection of the Elector
Maximilian II Emanuel of Bavaria (1662–1726), a provenance history thatwas handed down by word of mouth in the family of Count Johann Franz
Ignaz Seyboltsdorff (1673–1711). It is said that Maximilian gave thepainting to the count in gratitude for the count’s political support. This© 2017 The Leiden Collection

Angel Appearing to Elijah
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provenance is quite plausible considering that Maximilian collected
paintings, particularly while serving as regent of the Southern Netherlands(1692–1701).[27] In 1698 he acquired 101 paintings from the Antwerp
collector Gisbert van Colen that are now in the Alte Pinakothek in Munich
and the Staatsgalerie Schleissheim. There is no surviving inventory madebefore Maximilian’s death, however, that confirms the provenance ofElijah
and the Angel from his collection.[28] In any event, the painting remainedwith the count’s descendants until 1945.

-Peter Schatborn© 2017 The Leiden Collection

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Endnotes
1. Kindly communicated by Marieke de Winkel.
2. See Albert Blankert, Ferdinand Bol (1616–1680): Rembrandt’s Pupil (Doornspijk, 1982), no.
5, pl. 3 (1642); Werner Sumowski, Gemälde der Rembrandt-Schüler in vier Bänden , 5 vols.
(Landau i.d. Pfalz, 1983), 1: no. 80, repro. (1642).
3. Oil on canvas, 193 x 133 cm., Hermitage, St. Petersburg, inv. no. 727.
4. Oil on canvas, 83 x 71 cm, Rijksmuseum Het Catharijneconvent, Utrecht, inv. no.
RMCCs24. See Albert Blankert, Ferdinand Bol (1616–1680): Rembrandt’s Pupil(Doornspijk, 1982), no. 11, pl. 2 (1641); Werner Sumowski, Gemälde der RembrandtSchüler in vier Bänden, 5 vols. (Landau i.d. Pfalz, 1983), 1, no. 79, repro. (1641); Robert
Schillemans, Bijbelschilderkunst rond Rembrandt (Utrecht, 1989) no. 4, repro. This author
reads the date as 1640.
5. Oil on canvas, 115.6 x 97.8 cm, Museum Pomorskie, Gdansk. See Albert Blankert,
Ferdinand Bol (1616–1680): Rembrandt’s Pupil (Doornspijk, 1982) no. 1, pl. 11 (ca. 1650);
Werner Sumowski, Gemälde der Rembrandt-Schüler in vier Bänden , 5 vols. (Landau i.d.
Pfalz, 1983), 1: no. 89, repro. (ca. 1650).
6. See Albert Blankert, Ferdinand Bol (1616–1680): Rembrandt’s Pupil (Doornspijk, 1982), no.
7, pl. 6; Werner Sumowski, Gemälde der Rembrandt-Schüler in vier Bänden , 5 vols.
(Landau i.d. Pfalz, 1983), 1: no. 82, repro.
7. Werner Sumowski, Gemälde der Rembrandt-Schüler in vier Bänden , 5 vols. (Landau i.d.
Pfalz, 1983), 5: no. 2005, repro.
8. Otto Benesch, Otto Benesch Collected Writings, ed. Eva Benesch, 2 vols. (London and New
York, 1970–73), 1: no. 167, fig. 196 (Rembrandt).
9. Martin Royalton-Kisch, Drawings by Rembrandt and His Circle in the British
Museum (London, 1992), under no. 90, note 2 (doubtful attribution); Martin Royalton-Kisch,
Catalogue of Drawings by Rembrandt and His School in the British Museum (online
catalogue), no. 117, note 2 (doubtful attribution). (www.britishmuseum.org)
10. Peter Schatborn, Rembrandt and His Circle: Drawings in the Frits Lugt Collection (Paris,2010), no. 33, repro.
11. Otto Benesch, Otto Benesch Collected Writings, ed. Eva Benesch, 2 vols. (London and New
York, 1970–73), 1: no. 167, fig. 196 (Rembrandt).
12. Ingrid Oud, “De tekeningen van Ferdinand Bol: De relatie tussen de stijl en de functie van detekeningen,” Kunstlicht 13, no. 1 (1992): 9.
13. “Gy leerlingen zult niet alleen uwe meesters gehoorzaemen, maar hem ook in’t onderwijs
gelooven. Die uit den mont van de meester wat leeren wil, moet datzelve naekomen, zonder© 2017 The Leiden Collection

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eenige onderzoekinge, soo lange totdat hij hetgeenige dater geleert is, wel en terecht
verstaet.” “Daarom zoude ik de leerlingen liever een vijfjaerig stilzwijgen opleggen en een
stiktelijke gehoorzaemheid aanbevelen … op dat zij eerst te degen hetgene hen aanbevolenis, zouden leeren in ’t werk stellen.” Samuel van Hoogstraten, Inleyding tot de hooge
schoole der schilderkonst: Anders de zichtbaere werelt… (Rotterdam, 1678), 26.
14. Pen and brown ink, brush and brown and white ink, 158 x 217 mm, Musée des Beaux-Arts,
Besançon, inv. no. D.2756. See Werner Sumowski,Gemälde der Rembrandt-Schüler in vierBänden, 5 vols. (Landau i.d. Pfalz, 1983), 5: no. 1277, repro.
15. Pen and brown ink, 157 x 115 mm, Ossolineum, Kraków; Werner Sumowski,Gemälde derRembrandt-Schüler in vier Bänden, 5 vols. (Landau i.d. Pfalz, 1983), 1: no. 98, repro.
16. Signed and dated 1644, oil on canvas, 280 x 358 cm, Statens Museum for Kunst,
Copenhagen, inv. no. 77; See Werner Sumowski, Gemälde der Rembrandt-Schüler in vierBänden, 5 vols. (Landau i.d. Pfalz, 1983), 1: no. 83, repro.
17. Christian Tümpel, “Religious History Painting,” in God, Saints and Heroes: Dutch Painting
in the Age of Rembrandt , ed. Albert Blankert (Exh. cat. Washington D.C., National Gallery ofArt; The Detroit Institute of Arts; Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum, 1980) (Washington, 1980), 54,
n. 24.
18. On this subject, see Gabriël M. C. Pastoor, “Bijbelse historiestukken in particulier bezit,” inChristian Tümpel et. al., Het oude testament in de schilderkunst van de gouden eeuw (Exh.
cat. Amsterdam, Joods Historich Museum; Jerusalem, Israel Museum, 1991), 122–33.
19. The significance of Elijah to the Jews is also apparent from the rite of circumcision in which
the child is placed upon the “chair of Elijah,” who is thus present as a witness; Volker
Manuth, “Ikonographische Studien zu den Historien des Alten Testaments bei Rembrandt
und seiner frühen Amsterdamer Schule” (Ph.D. diss., Freie University, Berlin, 1987), 79–81;
Gabriël M. C. Pastoor, “Bijbelse historiestukken in particulier bezit,” in Christian Tümpel et.
al., Het oude testament in de schilderkunst van de gouden eeuw (Exh. cat. Amsterdam,
Joods Historisch Museum; Jerusalem, Israel Museum) (Amsterdam, 1991), 125.
20. Kindly communicated by Marieke de Winkel. This is also true of representations of such
subjects as Elijah Fed by Ravens.
21. Oil on panel, 48 x 35 cm, present whereabouts unknown. See Werner Sumowski,Gemälde
der Rembrandt-Schüler in vier Bänden , 5 vols. (Landau i.d. Pfalz, 1983), 4: no. 2196, repro.
Sumowski dates this painting close to the one in Gdansk (ca. 1650); see Albert Blankert,
Ferdinand Bol (1616–1680): Rembrandt’s Pupil (Doornspijk, 1982) no. 1, pl. 11 (ca. 1650);
Werner Sumowski, Gemälde der Rembrandt-Schüler in vier Bänden , 5 vols. (Landau i.d.
Pfalz, 1983), 1: no. 89, repro. (ca. 1650).
22. J. W. von Moltke, Govaert Flinck, 1615–1660 (Amsterdam, 1965), no. 32+, repro. (1642?);
Werner Sumowski, Gemälde der Rembrandt-Schüler in vier Bänden , 5 vols. (Landau i.d.
© 2017 The Leiden Collection

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Pfalz, 1983), 2: no. 620, repro. (1640). According to the museum’s documentation, thedating to 1645 was assigned by Hofstede de Groot in “Govaert Flinck,” Thieme-Becker,
Algemeines Lexikon der Bildenden Künstler , 37 vols. (Leipzig, 1916) 12: 28–30. With
thanks to Tom van der Molen.
23. Peter Schatborn, Rembrandt and His Circle: Drawings in the Frits Lugt Collection (Paris,2010), no. 14, repro. (early 1650s). Willem Drost also made a drawing of this subject in theearly 1650s (Rijksprentenkabinet, Amsterdam).
24. These drawings comprise: 1) a copy in Musée Bonnat-Helleu, Bayonne, see Werner
Sumowski, Drawings of the Rembrandt School , 10 vols. (New York, 1979–), 1: no. 210*,repro.; 2) a drawing, worked up later, which is now preserved in Hessisches
Landesmuseum, Darmstadt, see Werner Sumowski, Drawings of the Rembrandt School , 10
vols. (New York, 1979–), 1: no. 266*, repro; and 3) a variant in Buenos Aires of the drawing
in Bayonne, Z. Bruck Collection, see Werner Sumowski, Drawings of the Rembrandt
School, 10 vols. (New York, 1979–), 1: 268*, repro.
25. Oil on canvas, 96.5 x 121.9 cm, Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Harry Moore, Kenilworth, Illinois.
Alfred Bader, The Bible through Dutch Eyes: From Genesis through the Apocrypha (Exh.
cat. Milwaukee, Milwaukee Art Center) (Milwaukee, 1976), no. 52, repro.

26. Pen and brush and brown ink, traces of black chalk, 153 x 157 mm, with Martin Moeller,
Hamburg, as by 2003. See Alfred Bader, The Bible through Dutch Eyes: From Genesis
through the Apocrypha (Exh. cat. Milwaukee, Milwaukee Art Center) (Milwaukee, 1976), no.
52, repro.; Christian Dittrich and Thomas Ketelsen, Rembrandt: Die Dresdener Zeichnungen(Exh. cat. Dresden, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden, Kupferstich-Kabinett) (Cologne,2004), no. 75B, repro. and p. 16, fig. 12.
27. Johann Georg Prinz von Hohenzollern, ed., Staatsgalerie Schleissheim: Verzeichnis derGemälde (Munich, 1980), 8–9.
28. Oil on canvas, 128 x 97 cm, Gemäldegalerie, Dresden, inv. 1604. See Albert Blankert,
Ferdinand Bol (1616–1680): Rembrandt’s Pupil (Doornspijk, 1982), no. 5, pl. 3 (1642);
Werner Sumowski, Gemälde der Rembrandt-Schüler in vier Bänden , 5 vols. (Landau i.d.
Pfalz, 1983), 1: no. 80, repro. (1642). Jacob’s Dream also has an old German provenance,
for it was recorded as early as 1722 in the inventory of the collection in Dresden of August
the Strong, Elector of Saxony (1670–1733).

Provenance
Probably purchased by Maximilian II Emanuel, Bavarian Elector (1662–1726).
© 2017 The Leiden Collection

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Count Johann Franz Ignaz Seyboltsdorff (1673–1711); by descent to Karl August Graf vonFreyen-Seyboltsdorff (1867–1945), Schloß Seyboltsdorff, Germany, until 1945.
Private collection, Germany (Sotheby’s, London, 5 December 2007, no. 27 [Johnny van
Haeften Ltd., London]).
From whom acquired by the present owner in 2007.

Exhibition History
Los Angeles, J. Paul Getty Museum, on loan to permanent collection, September
2009–November 2016 [lent by the present owner].
Beijing, National Museum of China, “Rembrandt and His Time: Masterpieces from The
Leiden Collection,” 17 June–3 September 2017 [lent by the present owner].

References
Schatborn, Peter. Rembrandt and His Circle: Drawings in the Frits Lugt Collection . 2 vols.
Paris, 2010, 1:106; 2:127, no. 14.
Schatborn, Peter, and Van Sloten, Leonore. Old Drawings, New Names: Rembrandt and
His Contemporaries. Exh. cat. Amsterdam, Museum het Rembrandthuis. Varik, 2014, 33,
no. 2a.

Technical Summary
The support is composed of two sections of fine-weight, plain-weave fabric, joined with a verticalseam left of center, which has been lined.[1] There are tacking margin fragments along all foursides and slight cusping along the upper and lower edges. No wax collection seals, importstamps, stencils, inscriptions or labels are located along the lining or stretcher reverse.
A dark-colored ground has been thinly and evenly applied followed by multiple glazes of paintapplied to achieve volume and modeling. A cool underlayer delineates the veins and gives form
to Elijah’s proper left hand, followed by warm flesh-toned glazes. The drapery appears to havebeen similarly built up from undermodeling to final glazes. Feathered strokes, where one color
meets another, further enhance the illusion of volume.
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No underdrawing or compositional changes are readily apparent in infrared images or Xradiograph.
The painting is unsigned and undated.
The painting has not undergone conservation treatment since acquisition in 2007 and remains ina good state of preservation.[2]Technical Summary Endnotes

1. Approx. 85.1 cm from left edge. The seam is not visible in the X-radiograph or infrared
images provided.
2. Entry based on an examination report prepared by Yvonne Szafran, head of paintings
conservation, J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, 2011.

© 2017 The Leiden Collection