Karel DUJARDIN (Amsterdam 1626 - Venice 1678) - Lot 12

Karel DUJARDIN (Amsterdam 1626 - Venice 1678) A young shepherdess and her donkey in an Italian landscape Canvas 70 x 50 cm Signed and dated lower center "K. DV JARDIN/1659"; bears an old label with 19th century inscriptions on the reverse of the canvas and an old sales label on the reverse of the stretcher. Provenance: - Sale Jacob van der Lely, Delft, April 5, 1796, no. 2 (535 florins to Van der Pot) ; - Possible sale Gerrit van der Pot, September 9, 1803 for 1,900 florins to Alexandre Joseph Paillet ; - Lespinasse de Langeac] sale Paris, January 16-18, 1809, no. 6 (3,000 francs) ; - Perhaps sold again in Paris in 1810 (4,000 francs); - Eugène Schneider sale, Paris, April 6-7, 1876, no. 16 (5,100 francs); - Anonymous sale in Paris, May 23, 1932, no. 9; - Acquired at this sale by the current owner's grandparents; - By descent. Related work: A copy of our painting, unsigned, is listed by Jennifer M.Kilian, The paintings of Karel Du Jardin (1626 - 1678), pp. 228-229, B9, reproduced p. 408, plate 137 (sale in Stockholm, October 22-24, 1952, no. 117, pl. II, Malmö, Lennart Lundh collection, 1982, as a "problematic attribution"). She assigns this painting the same history as ours up to 1932. Belonging to the second generation of Italianate painters, Karel Dujardin was inspired by Pieter van Lear's bambochade scenes and influenced by Jan Asselyn, Nicolaes Berchem and Paulus Potter in his early years. To this heritage, he added his knowledge of the clear, diffuse golden light of Claude Gellée dit Le Lorrain. He painted many different subjects (portraits, historical scenes), but his favorite theme remained the depiction of peasants with their herds in the countryside. He was a great painter of animals. His faithful representation of species, his Dutch-style realism and the texture of his coats are remarkable, the whole unified by the limpid atmosphere of the Italian sky. Our painting is similar to the composition in the Nationalmuseum in Stockholm, dated 1659. This one features a similar layering of a gray storm cloud in front of a bright white one. We thank Professor Jennifer Mary Kilian for confirming the authenticity of this work by Karel Dujardin, on digital photography, by e-mail on October 24, 2024.