Portrait of a Man with a Hat

1641

Govaert Flinck(Kleve 1615 – 1660 Amsterdam)oil on panel
91.3 x 74.5 cm
signed and dated in brown paint, lower rightcorner: “G.flinck.ft 1641”
GF-100© 2017 The Leiden Collection

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How To Cite
Yeager-Crasselt, Lara. "Portrait of a Man with a Hat." 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

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In this distinguished half-length portrait, Govaert Flinck has depicted a well-Comparative Figures

dressed, elegant gentleman clasping a broad-brimmed black hat before
his chest.[1] Exuding an unassuming confidence, he stands turned to theright in a three-quarter pose as he directs a steady gaze toward theviewer. His sober, black costume is accented by a wide, white lace collar
and sleeve cuffs that gently fold at his wrists. He has shoulder-length
brown hair, a goatee and a thick moustache that curves slightly upward.
Wrinkles beneath his eyes and a thinning hairline reveal the sitter’s middle
age, while his plump face and rotund body suggest a comfortably lived life.
By rendering the figure with flushed cheeks and slightly parted lips, Flinck
achieved a sense of immediacy in this otherwise reserved and formal
portrait.
Flinck turned to Rembrandt van Rijn’s (1606–69) Portrait of a Man

Fig 1. Rembrandt van Rijn,
Portrait of a Man Holding His Hat,ca. 1639, oil on panel, 81.4 x 71.4
cm, Armand Hammer Collection,
UCLA, at the Armand Hammer
Museum of Art and CulturalCenter, Los Angeles

Holding His Hat (fig 1) from ca. 1639 as the compositional model for theLeiden Collection painting. He followed the same half-length format andsimilarly posed his sitter looking at the viewer while holding his hat withboth hands.[2] Although Flinck’s sitter is more modestly dressed thanRembrandt’s wealthy—and likely foreign—gentleman, he also wears alace-trimmed white linen collar and cuffs, which Flinck suggestivelyrendered with controlled yet loose brushwork.[3] Flinck similarly situated hissitter against a bare plaster wall which, as in Rembrandt’s painting, has afaint crack helping to define its position in space.[4] Subtle differences,
however, exist between Rembrandt’s and Flinck’s portraits. Rembrandt’s
gentleman has a slight forward thrust to his body which, combined with theshimmering fabric of his jacket and the pronounced chiaroscuro effects themaster used to model his form, creates a subtle sense of movement to theFig 2. Gerard ter Borch, Portraitof a Gentleman, ca. 1652–53, oil
on panel, 28 x 23 cm, private
collection

image. Flinck’s gentleman stands quite comfortably where he is,seemingly in no hurry to change his position or to don the wide-brimmed
black hat that he holds so firmly in his hands.[5]This portrait type was popular in Amsterdam in the middle decades of theseventeenth century. Flinck repeated this compositional model in hisPortrait of a Man from 1645 in Bonn, but situated the figure beneath aclassicizing arch and an open, blue sky, revealed by a curtain which has
been pulled aside.[6] Gerard ter Borch (1617–81) also adapted this figure’s
pose in his Portrait of a Gentleman (fig 2) from ca. 1652–53. In this work,Ter Borch similarly depicted a sober, sensitively rendered image of a
wealthy Amsterdam burgher turned to the right and carrying a large black© 2017 The Leiden Collection

Portrait of a Man with a Hat
Page 4 of 8hat.[7] Although none of the identities of these sitters is known, one candeduce from their distinguished air that they all belonged to the upperechelon of Amsterdam society.
-Lara Yeager-Crasselt© 2017 The Leiden Collection

Portrait of a Man with a Hat
Page 5 of 8Endnotes
1. See J. W. von Moltke, Govaert Flinck (1615–1660) (Amsterdam, 1965), 131, no. 108;
Stichting Foundation Rembrandt Research Project, A Corpus of Rembrandt Paintings , vol.
3, 1635–1642, ed. Josua Bruyn et al. (Dordrecht, Boston, and London, 1989), 310.
2. For Rembrandt’s portrait and its relationship to GF-100, see Albert Blankert, ed.,Rembrandt: A Genius and His Impact (Exh. cat. Melbourne, National Gallery of Victoria;
Canberra, National Gallery of Australia) (Zwolle, 1997), 124–26, no. 12; Stichting
Foundation Rembrandt Research Project, A Corpus of Rembrandt Paintings, vol. 3,1635–1642, ed. Josua Bruyn et al. (Dordrecht, Boston, and London, 1989), 305–11, A130,
particularly 310–11. Based on the compositional similarities between the two works, theauthors of the Corpus suggested that the Rembrandt panel had been reduced at the rightand bottom (prior to a 1771 sale that describes its present dimensions), during which time
the original signature was lost. The present signature on the Rembrandt painting is believed
to have been added later. Flinck’s signature is indistinctly observable in the lower right of
GF-100.
3. Rembrandt’s portrait may represent a foreign aristocrat, a supposition that results from thesitter’s unusual dress, which was not reflective of contemporary Amsterdam fashion. He is
dressed in a gray taffeta costume “with a pinkish-purple lustre” and golden-yellow braiding
along its seams. For Rembrandt’s sitter’s costume, see Stichting Foundation Rembrandt
Research Project, A Corpus of Rembrandt Paintings , vol. 3, 1635–1642, ed. Josua Bruyn etal. (Dordrecht, Boston, and London, 1989), 305, 308–9.
4. Stichting Foundation Rembrandt Research Project, A Corpus of Rembrandt Paintings , vol.
3, 1635–1642, ed. Josua Bruyn et al. (Dordrecht, Boston, and London, 1989), 310; Albert
Blankert, ed., Rembrandt: A Genius and His Impact (Exh. cat. Melbourne, National Galleryof Victoria; Canberra, National Gallery of Australia) (Zwolle, 1997), 126.
5. The work of the Haarlem artist Johannes Cornelisz Verspronck (1600–62) also served as aprecedent to this portrait type. The standing, turned pose, foreshortened elbow, andoccasional hat motif were common compositional elements in Verspronck’s oeuvre,including the 1641 Portrait of a Man (Rijksmuseum Twenthe, Enschede) and the Portrait ofEduard Wallis, from 1652 (oil on panel, 97 x 75 cm, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam). In the latter
image, Verspronck shows the sitter seated, though still holding a hat. See R. E. O. Ekkart,
Johannes Cornelisz. Verspronck (Haarlem, 1979).
6. Portrait of a Man, oil on canvas, 102 x 82 cm, Rheinisches Landesmuseum, Bonn. See J. W.
von Moltke, Govaert Flinck (1615–1660) (Amsterdam, 1965), 131, no. 310; Werner
Sumowksi, Gemälde der Rembrandt-Schüler in vier Bänden , 6 vols. (Landau, 1983),
2:1038, 1132, no. 700.
© 2017 The Leiden Collection

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7. Arthur K. Wheelock Jr. first noted the close similarities between Ter Borch’s and Flinck’s
portrait types, situating both images within an Amsterdam portrait tradition. Ter Borch,however, depicted his sitter with a smaller collar with tassels, which was consistent withcontemporary fashion. See Arthur K. Wheelock Jr., ed., Gerard ter Borch (Exh. cat.
Washington D.C., National Gallery of Art; Detroit Institute of Arts) (New Haven, 2005), 100.

Provenance
Vavasour Earle, London (his sale, Christie’s, London, 31 May 1906, no. 19 [to Hughes]).
L. Biruschansky, Paris, by 1936.
[Samuel Nystad Oude Kunst B. V., The Hague, by 1968/69] (sale, Christie’s, London, 11June 1971, no. 109 [to the J. Paul Getty Museum].
J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, until 2007 (sale, Sotheby’s Amsterdam, 8 May 2007,
no. 67 [Johnny van Haeften, Ltd., London]).
From whom acquired by the present owner in 2007.

Exhibition History
Delft, Stedelijk Museum het Prinsenhof, “20e Oude kunst-en antiekbeurs der Vereeniging
van Handelaren in Oude Kunst in Nederland: 1948–1968,” 20 June–10 July 1968.
Montreal, Museum of Fine Arts, “Rembrandt and His Pupils: A Loan Exhibition,” 9January–23 February 1969; Toronto, Art Gallery of Ontario, 14 March–27 April 1969, 90, no.
62 [lent by Samuel Nystad Oude Kunst B.V.].
Kleve, Museum Kurhaus Kleve, “Govert Flinck: Reflecting History,” 4 October 2015–17
January 2016, no. 9 [lent by the present owner].

References
Von Moltke, J. W. Govaert Flinck (1615–1660). Amsterdam, 1965, 131, no. 308.
Rembrandt and His Pupils: A Loan Exhibition . Exh. cat. Montreal, Museum of Fine Arts;
Toronto, Art Gallery of Ontario. Montreal, 1969, no. 62.
Fredericksen, B. B. Catalogue of the Paintings in the J. Paul Getty Museum . Malibu, 1972,© 2017 The Leiden CollectionPortrait of a Man with a Hat
Page 7 of 8no. 104.
Sumowski, Werner. Gemälde der Rembrandt-Schüler in vier Bänden.

6 vols. (Landau,1983), 2:1038, 1129, no. 697.
Sutton, Peter C. A Guide to Dutch Art in America. Grand Rapids, 1986, 146.
Gaskell, Ivan. The Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection: Seventeenth-Century Dutch andFlemish Painting. London: 1990, 131–32, under no. 24, fig. 1.
Jaffé, David. Summary Catalogue of European Paintings in the J. Paul Getty Museum . Los
Angeles, 1997, 43.
Blankert, Albert, ed. Rembrandt: A Genius and His Impact . Exh. cat. Melbourne, National
Gallery of Victoria; Canberra, National Gallery of Australia. Zwolle, 1997–98, 124, fig. 12b.
Bruyn, Josua, et al. A Corpus of Rembrandt Paintings . Vol. 3, 1635–1642. The Hague,
1989, 310–11, fig. 5.
Wheelock Jr., Arthur K., ed. Gerard ter Borch. Exh. cat. Washington D.C., National Gallery ofArt; Detroit Institute of Arts. New Haven, 2004, 100, fig. 1.
Guerrero, Maria del Mar Borobia, ed. Catalogue Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza: Pintura
Antigua. Madrid, 2009, 133.
Van der Molen, Tom and Vlasic, Valentina. Govert Flinck–Reflecting History. Exh. cat.
Kleve, Museum Kurhaus Kleve. Kleve, 2015, 98, 131, no. 9.

Technical Summary
The support, a single plank of fairly thick, vertically grained and vertically oriented rectangularshaped hardwood, has no bevels.[1] The panel is unthinned and uncradled, and has a lightcolored priming layer along the reverse. There are four import stamps and two stencils along thereverse but no wax collection seals or panel maker’s marks.
A light-colored ground has been thinly and evenly applied. The paint has been applied thinly andsmoothly along the upper third of the background, allowing the ground to show through and moreopaquely along the lower two-thirds of the composition, obscuring the ground. A brown
underlayer along the figure’s hair remains visible through the loosely painted curls.
No underdrawing is readily apparent in infrared images captured at 780–1000 nanometers, but afew slight compositional changes are visible. The right side of the brim of the figure’s hat has
been shifted to the left, as has the lower portion the hat. There is no X-radiograph of the painting.
The painting is signed and dated in brown paint along the lower right corner.
The painting has not undergone conservation treatment since its acquisition in 2007 and remains
in a good state of preservation.

Technical Summary Endnotes© 2017 The Leiden CollectionPowered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

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1. The characterization of the wood as a “hardwood with vessels” is based on analysis
carried out at the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles.

© 2017 The Leiden Collection