Portrait of Barthout van Slingelandt
Godefridus Schalcken(Made 1643 – 1706 The Hague)1682
oil on copper
48.2 x 37.8 cm
signed in dark paint, upper left corner: “G.
Schalcken.”
GS-102© 2020 The Leiden Collection

Portrait of Barthout van Slingelandt
Page 2 of 12

How to cite
Jansen, Guido. “Portrait of Barthout van Slingelandt” (2017). In The Leiden Collection Catalogue, 2nd ed.
Edited by Arthur K. Wheelock Jr. New York, 2017–20. https://theleidencollection.com/artwork/portrait-ofbarthout-van-slingelandt/ (archived May 2020).
A PDF of every version of this entry is available in this Online Catalogue's Archive, and the Archive ismanaged by a permanent URL. New versions are added only when a substantive change to the narrative
occurs.

A sumptuously dressed man in the prime of his life is portrayed three-quarter-

Comparative Figures

length, seated in a wooded landscape, turned toward the right. He wears anallonge perruque, a periwig with flowing blond curls that cover his chest. A
magnificently decorated cloak in blue and gold-brown is draped around his
upper body over his white linen shirt, with elaborate lace trim at the neck. His
right hand is placed on his thigh while his left hand rests on a dead hare. In
the right background, a stag flees from a hunting hound bounding throughthe woods.
When the Amsterdam art dealer Pieter de Boer acquired this painting from a
private collection in Germany in 2004, the identity of the sitter was still
completely unknown. Soon afterward, however, the present author identified
the man as Barthout van Slingelandt (1654–1711) on the basis of a drawing
made by Mattheus Verheyden (1700–77) around 1733–35 (fig 1).[1]Verheyden’s drawing is an allegorizing interpretation of the portrait that hepatterned after a series of similar sheets in the so-called Slingelandt Album,
preserved in the archives of the High Council of Nobles in The Hague (fig 2).[2] In this drawing, a bust-length depiction of Barthout van Slingelandt isplaced within an oval frame on a pedestal and in a marble entablature
bearing the arms of Dordrecht (upper left) and Zuid-Holland (upper right).

Fig 1. Mattheus Verheyden,
Portrait of Barthout van Slingelandt(1654–1711), ca. 1733–35, black
chalk, heightened with white, ongray paper, 43.5 x 32.5 cm,
present whereabouts unknown(formerly collection Van Tets van
Goidschalxoord, Doorn, 1970),
photo RKD (Rijksbureau voor
Kunsthistorische
Documentatie/Netherlands
Institute for Art History), neg. no. E
663

Below these coats of arms are emblems representing the Munt (the Mint)
and the Rotterdam chamber of the West India Company (WIC), andpersonifications of Commerce and Justice—references to the most important
posts held by the sitter. The oval frame is crowned with Barthout’s coat of© 2020 The Leiden Collection

Portrait of Barthout van Slingelandt
Page 3 of 12

arms: two fesses embattled-counter-embattled argent in a sable field.
Aside from the identification of the sitter, the inscription on Verheyden’s
drawing provides important information about the sitter’s age and the datingof the painting. It reads: Hr. Barthout van Slingelandt, Hr. Govertsz: VrijHeer
van Slingelandt, etc. Ætatis 28. Ao. 1682. Obiit 1711. In other words,
Barthout was 28 when Schalcken painted his portrait in 1682. In terms ofstyle, the painting fits perfectly into this period of Schalcken’s oeuvre, andVerheyden had no need to speculate about the year because he could haveconsulted family records.[3]Barthout’s choice of Godefridus Schalcken as his portraitist was an obvious
one. In 1678 Barthout’s father, Govert van Slingelandt (1623–90), then at
the height of his power as secretary to the Council of State in The Hague,commissioned Schalcken, the most important master of his native city, topaint his portrait.[4] Civic patriotism certainly played a role in this commission.
The Van Slingelandts were an old and proud family whose members had
always pursued their successful careers from their power base in Dordrecht.
The oldest city of Holland, Dordrecht was privileged in being the first among
the cities in the States Assembly. Remaining true to the Van Slingelandt
tradition, in 1682 Barthout became a member of the Old Council (Oudraad)Fig 2. Mattheus
Verheyden, Portrait of Barthout
van Slingelandt (1654–1711),
ca. 1733–35, wash drawing in pen
and gray ink, heightened with red,
238 x 151 mm, Hoge Raad vanAdel, The Hague, Van Slingelandt
Archive, inv. no. 120A, photo RKD(Rijksbureau voor Kunsthistorische
Documentatie/Netherlands
Institute for Art History), neg.
no. 30124

of Dordrecht, the most important governing body of the city.[5] It was no
coincidence that he chose Schalcken to paint his portrait in the first year of
his governmental career.
Verheyden copied not only Barthout’s portrait but also its pendant, theportrait of his wife, Elisabeth van Bleiswijck (1663–1728), whom Barthout
married in Pijnacker in January 1684 (fig 3). Of this picture, too, Verheyden
made an allegorizing interpretation, patterned after the other sheets intended
for the Slingelandt Album.[6] The inscription reveals that Schalcken painted
her in 1685 when she was 23 years old (fig 4). These two paintings thus
originated three years apart. The couple had three sons: Govert(1692–1776), Bertout (1694–1752), and Hendrik (1702–59). Hendrik had astrong interest in genealogy, and it was he who asked Verheyden, active in
The Hague, to make drawn copies of the family portraits and to produce thesheets comprising the Slingelandt Album.[7]Hendrik served for years as a magistrate and burgomaster of The Hague.
His eldest brother, Govert, was burgomaster of Dordrecht; as the eldest son,he had inherited not only this patrimonial office but also the most importantfamily portraits.[8] Only when he died without male issue did the ancestralFig 3. Mattheus Verheyden,
Portrait of Elisabeth van Bleiswijck(1663–1728), ca. 1733–35, black
chalk, heightened with white, ongray paper, 435 x 325 mm,present whereabouts unknown(formerly collection Van Tets van
Goidschalxoord, Doorn, 1970),
photo RKD (Rijksbureau voor
Kunsthistorische
Documentatie/Netherlands
Institute for Art History), neg. no. E
664

portraits end up in the possession of Hendrik’s eldest son, Barthout van© 2020 The Leiden Collection

Portrait of Barthout van Slingelandt
Page 4 of 12

Slingelandt (1731–98). He transferred them to his country house Zuijdwindt
near ’s-Gravenzande, which he had inherited from his grandmother
Elisabeth van Bleiswijck. It was there, in 1808, after the death of Barthout’s
second wife, Magdalena Anna Elisabeth van Boetzelaer (1756–1808), thatan inventory was drawn up that listed “eighteen family portraits of the Van
Slingelandts, each of which bears an inscription on the back with the nameand the time of birth of the sitter.”[9] Hanging in the house at this time was thefamily heirloom, painted in 1657 by Jan Mijtens (1614–70), which portrayed
the apparently flourishing family of Govert van Slingelandt (fig 5).[10] This
group portrait includes a posthumous depiction of Barthout’s mother,
Christina van Beveren (1631–56); she and her daughter, Christina, diedwhen the infant boy was only two years old.
The subsequent fate of the collection of family portraits is unclear. Shortly
after 1811, Zuijdwindt was sold by its heirs and eventually demolished,probably because of financial losses in the Napoleonic era. The portraits
were then probably inherited by Hendrik van Slingelandt Barthoutsz(1788–1868). Shortly thereafter, some of them were dispersed, possibly
having been sold, as can be deduced from the fact that in 1842 the portraits
Schalcken made of Barthout’s father, Govert, and his second wife,

Fig 4. Mattheus Verheyden,
Portrait of Elisabeth van Bleiswijck(1663–1728), ca. 1733–35, wash
drawing in pen and gray ink,
heightened with red, 240 x 152
mm, Hoge Raad van Adel, The
Hague, Van Slingelandt Archive,
inv. no. 143A, photo RKD(Rijksbureau voor Kunsthistorische
Documentatie/Netherlands
Institute for Art History), neg. no.
30125

Arnoudina van Beaumont (1635–1702), in 1678 were in the famous
collection of Baron Johan Gijsbert Verstolk van Soelen (1776–1845) in The
Hague.[11] No other portrait of a member of this branch of the Van Slingelandt
family has ever been traced to this period, so it seems most likely that theheirs divided up the collection privately or sold it, perhaps to relatives. It
therefore came as a complete surprise when Schalcken’s portrait ofBarthout appeared in late 2004. One can only hope that its pendant of
Elisabeth van Bleiswijck will one day surface as well.
Schalcken portrayed Barthout in an unusual way, presenting him as aparticipant in the hunt. Even more telling than the dead hare is the scene in
the background of a hound chasing a stag (in terms of large game, wild boar
had disappeared from Holland by the sixteenth century). Hunting of this kind
had traditionally been reserved for the sovereign ruler, first the counts ofHolland,

and

then

foresters” (opperhoutvesters),

later
[12]

the

stadholders,as“chiefFig 5. Jan Mijtens, Portrait ofGovert van Slingelandt(1623–1690), Lord of Dubbeldam,with His First Wife Christina van
Beveren (1631–1656), 1657, oil oncanvas, 99.5 x 86.5 cm,
Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, SKA-4013

whereas hunting of small furry game (haresand rabbits) and feathered game (pheasants, partridges and ducks) was
rated less highly.[13] Hunting was the only exclusively noble privilege left tothis old elite.[14] The nobility of Holland had the right to hunt small game in the“Wilderness,” which comprised the woods and dunes between the Meuse
River and Zijpe polder and several adjoining areas belonging to the former© 2020 The Leiden Collection

Portrait of Barthout van Slingelandt
Page 5 of 12

domains of the counts of Holland. The Wilderness, officially called the“Forestry” (Houtvesterij) of Holland and West Friesland, was also the only
hunting ground of consequence in this province.[15] Members of the nobility
were forced to share their hunting privileges with the highest officials in theprovincial government. Supervision of the hunt in the count’s former
Wilderness was the responsibility of one of the oldest courts of the land: theCouncil of Woodward and Master Servants (Houtvester en Meesterknapen).
They were charged with issuing hunting licenses and with administering
justice in all hunt-related cases. Stag hunting with hounds in the Forestry of
Holland was, therefore, a highly exclusive pastime and a pleasure reserved
mainly for the nobility.
The inclusion of the hunting scene makes it clear that Barthout van
Slingelandt had himself portrayed as a nobleman, although he might betterbe described as someone with noble pretensions. If indeed he participated in
the stag hunt, he could have done so in the vicinity of his own home only inthe dunes between The Hague and Scheveningen and in the woods known
as the Haagse Bos, hunting grounds supervised by the Forestry.[16]Schalcken’s portrait, therefore, provides insight into the aristocratization of
the wealthy urban regents, among whom the Van Slingelandts could becounted (though it must be admitted that Barthout’s mother, Christina van
Beveren, was a descendant of an old knightly family of Holland).
After the death of his father in 1690, Barthout became Lord of Dubbeldam,
but this title of nobility did not gain him admittance to Holland’s College ofNobles, nor did it grant him the rights to vote in the States assembly and tohunt in the Wilderness. Deriving from a collateral branch of the family, theownership of the seigneury of Slingelandt in the Alblasserwaard polder had
fallen to the Pompe (van Meerdervoort en Slingelandt) family, likewise from
Dordrecht. It must therefore have been a great triumph for Barthout and his
family when, in 1705, he purchased from his cousin Isabella Jacoba Pompe
van Slingelandt (1657–1718) the seigneurial rights that made him Lord of
Slingelandt. There was no greater sign of prestige for the nobility, and theregents’ families who sought to associate with them, than the possession ofa seigneury or barony from which the owner derived his family name.[17]Moreover, Slingelandt was a so-called free or high barony, which increased
his standing even more, since the owner possessed not only the usual rightto tithe and all rights connected with hunting and fishing, but also the right toadminister corporal punishment and even the right to condemn and executecriminals.[18]© 2020 The Leiden Collection

Portrait of Barthout van Slingelandt
Page 6 of 12

When this portrait was painted, only the seigneury of Dubbeldam was in thefamily’s possession, but high offices had been held by members of thefamily for generations. After studying law in Leiden, in 1677 Barthout began
his career as a counselor at the Court of Holland. His most important
positions were magistrate and burgomaster of Dordrecht, master-general ofthe mint of the United Netherlands, councilor and deputy to the Admiralty on
the Meuse, treasurer-general of the province of Zuid-Holland, governor of the
Dutch West India Company, and member of the Council of State. With
regard to the family’s rise in standing, its elevation to the nobility by Emperor
Joseph I in 1702 was of immense importance. Both Barthout and his halfbrother Govert Johan (1665–1703) were henceforth allowed to bear thehereditary title of Baron of the Holy Roman Empire, a title that had no legal
significance in the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands, butnevertheless added great luster to the family name. It is therefore interesting
to note that the aspirations displayed by Barthout van Slingelandt inSchalcken’s splendid portrait of 1682 indeed came to fruition twenty years
later.

- Guido Jansen, 2017

© 2020 The Leiden Collection

Portrait of Barthout van Slingelandt
Page 7 of 12

Endnotes

1. The period in which Mattheus Verheyden worked for the Van Slingelandt family is based on anumber of drawings in the family archive kept at the Hoge Raad van Adel (High Council ofNobles) in The Hague. These include the drawings, signed by Verheyden and dated 1733, ofthe gold goblet presented in 1702 by Frederick I, King of Prussia, to Barthout van Slingelandt.
See also the two portrait drawings Verheyden made of his patron Hendrik van Slingelandt
Barthoutsz (1702–59) and his wife, Maria Catharina van der Burch (1707–61), for the socalled Slingelandt Album, both signed in full and dated 1735; J. C. Kort, Het archief van defamilie Van Slingelandt 1438–1868 (’s-Gravenhage, 2004), 18, inv. no. 248, figs. 5 and 6.
The portraits are also reproduced in Charles Dumas and H. P. R. Rosenberg, eds., Het
Kabinet der Koningin: Geschiedenis van het instituut en het huis aan de Korte Vijverberg (’sGravenhage, 1991), 183. This black-chalk drawing, heightened with white, on gray paper isstill in the possession of the sitter’s descendants. The drawing measures 43.5 x 32.5 cm andwas to be found in 1970 in Doorn in the possession of Constance Hooft, dowager of Gerard
Frederik van Tets van Goidschalxoord. Jacob van Slingelandt, the last descendant ofBarthout’s branch of the family, died in 1878. A sister of his, Catharina (1819–58), wasmarried to Jacob George Hieronymus van Tets (1812–85), and the drawn copies of theportraits were inherited by their grandson Gerard Frederik (1875–1968); see “Van
Tets,” Nederland’s adelsboek 95 (2010): 148. The Barony of Goidschalxoord in the Hoekse
Waard polder actually came into the family in 1758, when Barthout van Slingelandt Hendriksz(1731–98) married Margaretha Berck (1730–86), Lady of Goidschalxoord. In fact, it was
through this branch of the family that a deplorably bad, partial copy of Schalcken’s portrait,
painted by Cornelis van Cuylenburg (1758–1827) around 1802, was passed down to later
generations. This portrait and its pendant were bequeathed fairly recently to the Simon van
Gijn Museum in Dordrecht (oil on canvas, affixed to panel, 52 x 46 cm, oval).
2. These wash drawings measure 24 x 15 cm; two identical specimens are preserved at the
Hoge Raad van Adel, Archief van Slingelandt, inv. no. 120A–120B, one signed and one
unsigned; J. C. Kort, Het archief van de familie Van Slingelandt 1438–1868 (’s-Gravenhage,2004), 10. Thanks to the two drawings (figs. 1 and 2), the portrait was known to Moes andHofstede de Groot, who duly recorded it (see References). Following Hofstede de Groot,
Beherman included it in his list of works. None of them knew the original.
3. The notarial approval of 1741 that accompanies the gilt drawings that Verheyden made of thegold goblet in 1733 is probably unique (see note 1). In this document, the notary officiallydeclares that the artist portrayed everything in a true-to-life manner; J. C. Kort, Het archiefvan de familie Van Slingelandt 1438–1868 (’s-Gravenhage, 2004), 121 appendix B, no. 1.
4. Thierry Beherman, Godfried Schalcken (Paris, 1988), 189, no. 90 (oil on copper, 41.5 x 32.5
© 2020 The Leiden Collection

Portrait of Barthout van Slingelandt
Page 8 of 12cm), present whereabouts unknown. Schalcken’s preparatory drawing (made in 1678) for thisportrait and the drawing Verheyden made after it are also preserved in the Slingelandt
Archive and were published by the present author in Guido Jansen, “Additions to Godfried
Schalcken’s Oeuvre as a Draftsman,” Hoogsteder-Naumann Mercury 13–14 (1992): 74–75,
with illustrations. As a sign of civic patriotism, it is enough to point out the Grote Kerk of
Dordrecht in the background of the portrait. By this time Govert van Slingelandt had been
living for more than 20 years in The Hague, where Barthout was in fact born. The Van
Slingelandt family probably paid the artist 50 guilders per portrait. This price can be deduced
from the 100 guilders that Cornelis de Jonge van Ellemeet (1646–1721) paid in 1698 in The
Hague for the life-size oval portraits of himself and his wife, Maria Oyens (1647–1732); see B.
E. de Muink, Een regentenhuishouding omstreeks 1700 (’s-Gravenhage, 1965), 178.
5. In other cities of Holland this governing body was called the vroedschap (town council).
6. This portrait likewise exists in two identical versions, one signed and one unsigned. They
were executed in the same technique and have the same measurements as the drawings
described in note 3; Hoge Raad van Adel, Archief van Slingelandt, inv. no. 143A–143B. See
J. C. Kort, Het archief van de familie Van Slingelandt 1438–1868 (’s-Gravenhage, 2004), 11.
7. On the family, see “Van Slingelandt,” Nederland’s adelsboek 93 (2008): 199–226. See J. C.
Kort, Het archief van de familie Van Slingelandt 1438–1868 (’s-Gravenhage, 2004) for
Hendrik’s great interest in genealogy; see also note 1. His father, Barthout, had actually been
the first to show such an interest, as evidenced by his purchase in 1696 of two manuscript
volumes of the Trophées de Brabant by the genealogist Christoforus Butkens (1590–1650).
8. This is apparent from, for example, the caption to the print that Jacobus Houbraken(1698–1780) made between 1752 and 1759 of Schalcken’s portrait of Govert van
Slingelandt, Barthout’s father: “na ’t Schilderij, berustende onder den Vrijheer van
Slingelandt, te Dordrecht” (after the painting in the possession of the Lord of Slingelandt, at
Dordrecht).
project

The

print

servedasanillustration

Vaderlandsche

Historie.

Alexanderto

VerHuell,Jan

Wagenaar’s

Jacobus21-volume

Houbraken

etsonoeuvre (Arnhem, 1875) 72, no. 386. The family archive also contains a noteworthy documentof ca. 1750–70, the opening words of which read: “Portraitten, die de Heer A. Schoumanzoude kunnen tykenen na de originele hangende bij den Vrij-Heer van Slingelandt te
Dordrecht” (Portraits that Mr. A. Schouman could perhaps draw after the originals hanging in
the house of the Baron of Slingelandt in Dordrecht). The document mentions a portrait ofBarthout, but does not name the painter; J. C. Kort, Het archief van de familie Van Slingelandt
1438–1868 (’s-Gravenhage, 2004), inv. no. 23.
9. “Achttien stuks famillepourtraitten van het geslagt van Slingelandt, op ieder van welke vanagteren de namen en de tijd der geboorte der pourtraitten zijn vermeld.” Cornelis Hofstede deGroot, “Schilderijenverzamelingen van het geslacht Slingelandt,” Oud Holland 10 (1892): 233;
see also J. C. Kort, Het archief van de familie Van Slingelandt 1438–1868 (’s-Gravenhage,© 2020 The Leiden Collection

Portrait of Barthout van Slingelandt
Page 9 of 122004), 11, inv. no. 315 III, fol. 193. I am indebted to Egbert Wolleswinkel, secretary to the
Hoge Raad van Adel, for checking the document published by Hofstede de Groot.
10. Alexandra Nina Bauer, Jan Mijtens (1613/14–1670): Leben und Werk (Petersberg, 2006),
261–62, no. A-138 with illustration.
11. In 1842 these paintings were included as Grand Pensioner de Witt and The Wife of thePreceding in the supplement of the list drawn up by John Smith of Schalcken’s works as
being in the collection “Verstolke de Soelen” [sic]; see John Smith, Supplement to theCatalogue Raisonné of the Works of the Most Eminent Dutch, Flemish, and French Painters(London, 1829–42), 590, nos. 9 and 10. Both portraits were described, still with the correct
identifications, in “Het kunstkabinet van Z. E. den Baron Verstolk van Soelen,” De
Nederlandsche Kunst-Spiegel 1 (1844–45): 92. In 1846 this collection was purchased
privately by three English gentlemen, after which the portrait of Govert van Slingelandt endedup, via Thomas Baring, in the collection of the Earl of Northbrook (as Portrait of De Witt), andthe portrait of Arnoudina van Beaumont in the collection of Mr. Chaplin (as Portrait of a Lady).
It is remarkable, nevertheless, that when Jean Paul Richter and James Weale catalogued thecollection of the Earl of Northbrook in 1889, they noted that before Verstolk came into thepossession of the portrait of Govert van Slingelandt, it had been in “a Collection in
Amsterdam.” See Jean Paul Richter and William H. J. Weale, A Descriptive Catalogue of theCollection of Pictures Belonging to the Earl of Northbrook (London, 1889), 68, no. 95. It has
not proved possible to find the source of this information.
12. Infact

thedutiesoftheofficewerecarried

out

by

a

“Lieutenant

Woodward” (Luitenant-Houtvester); J. C. Beth, “Het jachtrecht in Holland,” Bijdragen voor
Vaderlandsche Geschiedenis en Oudheidkunde 7 (1928): 95–112; Jaap Buis, Historia
forestis: Nederlandse bosgeschiedenis, vol. 1: Bosgebruik, bosbeheeren boswetgeving tot
het midden van de negentiende eeuw (Utrecht, 1985), 240–41, 294–96; Antheun Janse,
Ridderschap in Holland: Portret van een adellijke elite in de late middeleeuwen (Hilversum,2009), 352.
13. Ignaz B. M. Matthey, Vincken moeten vincken locken: Vijf eeuwen vangst van zangvogels en
kwartels in Holland (Haarlem and Hilversum, 2002), 219; Antheun Janse, Ridderschap in
Holland: Portret van een adellijke elite in de late middeleeuwen (Hilversum, 2009), 347.
14. Jaap Buis, Historia forestis: Nederlandse bosgeschiedenis, vol. 1: Bosgebruik, bosbeheerenboswetgeving tot het midden van de negentiende eeuw (Utrecht, 1985), 333; K. F. vanNierop, Van ridders tot regenten (Amsterdam, 1990), 47; Antheun Janse, Ridderschap in
Holland: Portret van een adellijke elite in de late middeleeuwen (Hilversum, 2009), 344–53(chapter 7.4 “De jacht als statussymbool”).
15. For a detailed description of the territories under the jurisdiction of the Forestry of Holland,
see J. C. Beth, “Het jachtrecht in Holland,” Bijdragen voor Vaderlandsche Geschiedenis en
Oudheidkunde 7 (1928): 95–112; see also Ignaz B. M. Matthey, Vincken moeten vincken© 2020 The Leiden Collection

Portrait of Barthout van Slingelandt
Page 10 of 12

locken: Vijf eeuwen vangst van zangvogels en kwartels in Holland (Haarlem and Hilversum,2002), 220. Only in 1716 was it decreed that burgomasters and town councilors of the cities
entitled to vote in the provincial assembly known as the States of Holland were permitted totake part in the noble hunt in the Forestry.
16. Jaap Buis, Historia forestis: Nederlandse bosgeschiedenis, vol. 1: Bosgebruik, bosbeheerenboswetgeving tot het midden van de negentiende eeuw (Utrecht, 1985), 329–33.
17. H. K. F. van Nierop, Van ridders tot regenten (Amsterdam, 1990), 156.
18. Antheun Janse, Ridderschap in Holland: Portret van een adellijke elite in de latemiddeleeuwen (Hilversum, 2009), 146–69.

Provenance
Barthout van Slingelandt (1654-1711); by descent to his son Govert van Slingelandt(1692-1776); by descent to his nephew Barthout van Slingelandt Hendriksz (1731-1798); by
descent to his heirs between 1811 and 1840.
Private collection, Germany, by November 2004.
[Kunsthandel P. de Boer B. V., Amsterdam, 2005].
From whom acquired by the present owner.

Exhibition History
Cologne, Wallraf-Richartz-Museum, “Godefridus Schalcken: Painted Seduction,” 25
September 2015–24 January 2016; Dordrecht, Dordrechts Museum, 21 February–26 June
2016 [lent by the present owner].
Moscow, The Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts, “The Age of Rembrandt and Vermeer:
Masterpieces of The Leiden Collection,” 28 March 2018–22 July 2018 [lent by the present
owner].
St. Petersburg, The State Hermitage Museum, “The Age of Rembrandt and Vermeer:
Masterpieces of The Leiden Collection,” 5 September 2018–13 January 2019 [lent by thepresent owner].

References© 2020 The Leiden Collection

Portrait of Barthout van Slingelandt
Page 11 of 12

Moes, Ernst Wilhelm. Iconographia Batava: Beredeneerde lijst van geschiderde en gebeeldhouwde portretten van Noord-Nederlanders in vorige eeuwen. 2 vols. Amsterdam,
1897–1905, 2: no. 7274, 1.
Hofstede de Groot, Cornelis. A Catalogue Raisonné of the Works of the Most Eminent Dutch
Painters of the Seventeenth Century Based on the Work of John Smith. Edited and translatedby Edward G. Hawke, 5: 400, no. 324. 8 vols. London, 1907–28. Originally published as
Beschreibendes und kritisches Verzeichnis der Werke der hervorragendsten höllandischen
Maler des XVII. Jahrhunderts. 10 vols. Esslingen and Paris, 1907–28.
Jansen, Guido. “Porträt des Barthout Govertsz. Van Slingelandt, 1682.” In Schalcken –Gemalte Verführung. Edited by Anja K. Sevcik, 209–12, no. 47. Exh. cat. Cologne, WallrafRichartz-Museum; Dordrecht, Dordrechts Museum. Stuttgart, 2015.
McCarthy, Alexa. “Portrait of Barthout van Slingelandt.” In The Age of Rembrandt andVermeer: Masterpieces of The Leiden Collection. Edited by Polina Lyubimova, 204–5; 246,
no. 69. Translated by Daria Babich and Daria Kuzina. Exh. cat. Moscow, The Pushkin State
Museum of Fine Arts; St. Petersburg, The State Hermitage Museum. Moscow, 2018.

Technical Summary
The support, a rectangular sheet of rolled copper, has substantial weight and does not flex whenhandled. A brown priming has been applied to the reverse by wide brush. A two-line, horizontallyoriented, indistinct inscription is centered along the upper half of the primed reverse. There are no
wax collection seals, labels, stencils or import stamps.
The copper support is sandwiched between a two-part support system. It rests on a wooden
strainer that is slightly larger than the copper in both directions. Four L-shaped wooden liner
members, which are secured to the strainer tacking edges with screws, sandwich the copper
between the strainer and liner members.[1]A light blue-gray ground has been thinly applied. Vertical brushwork through the figure’s face andcurls suggests the ground or an underlayer was applied with vertical strokes. The handling of thepaint is delicate and blended. The paint has been applied extremely smoothly with glazes throughthe figure’s flesh tones and curls. Even areas of highlight through the brocade are applied withextremely low rounded brushwork. Extremely fine brushstrokes define the hare’s whiskers andfur.
No underdrawing is readily apparent in infrared images captured at 780–1000 nanometers, andno compositional changes are visible in the images or as pentimenti.
The painting is signed in dark paint along the background in the upper left corner but is undated.
© 2020 The Leiden CollectionPowered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

Portrait of Barthout van Slingelandt
Page 12 of 12

The painting has not undergone conservation treatment since its acquisition in 2005 and remains
in a good state of preservation, although a fine network of craquelure has formed through brown
passages, and a small indentation along the right vertical edge may be due to a nail applied to thereverse during past framing.[2]Technical Summary Endnotes

1. Only the lower and right frame-liner members were removed during examination.
2. Indentation is 10 cm down from the upper edge, approximately 1 cm in from the right edge.

© 2020 The Leiden Collection