Die Töchter des Kekrops erblicken den jungen Erichthonios

Unknown artist

Benesch 0149 - Subject: The Daughters of Cecrops Opening the Chest Containing Erichthonius (Metamorphoses, II, 552-61 and 755-61) - Verso: Abraham with the Ram (Genesis, XXII, 13) - Medium: Pen and brown ink. - 98 x 96 (irregularly cut). - COMMENTS: The subject is unusual in western art, especially in the Low Countries, though was treated in Rembrandt’s circle a few times (see Benesch 0150 and 0622) and in a classicising style by Rubens.[1] - The vigorously drawn recto, with its exaggerated gestures and expressions, harks back to Rembrandt’s compositions of c.1630, including his first etching of the Raising of Lazarus (Bartsch 73). In the mid-1630s, the period to which the style of this drawing belongs, he still harked back to this histrionic mode in some comparable subjects – cf. especially Benesch 0178 and 0180, which also resemble the present drawing in style. For the penwork, compare also Benesch 0133 (especially the zigzag shading over the central figure, which resembles that in the lower right here) and Benesch 0144A (the figure of the Samaritan in the centre). Yet none of these drawings has documentary status; indeed, the distance in style from the documentary drawings is difficult to bridge, so that considerable doubts must remain concerning the attribution. Benesch 0093, a drawing of the same kind – an initial composition sketch in pen and brown ink – is also far removed in style. The analogies mentioned by Benesch with his no.0147 (see especially the figures on the right) suggest Gerbrand van den Eeckhout as the possible draughtsman. - The other drawings with comparable versos (see under Benesch 0129; the present one presumably represents Abraham with the Ram), which clearly have nothing to do with Rembrandt himself, further undermine the attribution of the present sheet to him. Various attributions have been suggested for these rather crudely drawn works, including Govert Flinck, Jan Victors and, in the present case, the name of C.D. van Renesse has been mentioned.[2] They are likely to be juvenilia or amateur work done in the circle of Rembrandt. - Summary attribution: Rembrandt?? Gerbrand van den Eeckhout?? - Date: 1635-37? - COLLECTION: D Göttingen, University. - FURTHER LITERATURE/REMARKS: Valentiner, II, 1934, under no.597; Benesch, I, 1954/73, no.149, repr. (c.1637; compared Benesch 147); Exh. Duisburg-Stuttgart-Wolfsburg, 1965, no.81, repr. fig. 29; Exh. Kiel-Marburg-Göttingen, 1966, no. 82; Pigler, 1974, II, p. 81; Sumowski, 1979 etc., under no. 806**; Exh. Göttingen-Gandersheim-Brunshausen-Bevern, 1993, p. 8, repr. fig.5; Exh. Koblenz-Göttingen–Oldenburg-Den Bosch, 2000-2001, no.51, repr. (recto Rembrandt, later 1630s; compares Benesch 180 for style, Benesch 150 and 622 for subject and contrasts Rubens’s versions of it; verso later, compares van Renesse); Golahny, 2003, p.251, n.33 (possibly related to mythological scenes Rembrandt may have produced); [Not in Schatborn, 2019]. - PROVENANCE: Museum Fodor (C.J. Fodor); acquired by exchange by the present repository in 1937. - [1] See Exh. Koblenz–Göttingen (etc.), 2000-2001, under no.51, which refers to Rubens’s oil-sketch of c.1615 (Held, 1980 no.231, repr. vol.II, pl.240) and another of c.1632-33 (op. cit., no.232, repr. pl.248), and to the painting in Vaduz (Exh. New York, 1985-86, no.205, repr. and the fragment in the Allen Memorial Art Museum (Stechow, 1967, pp.132-33, repr. fig.52). - [2] Exh. Koblenz–Göttingen (etc.), 2000-2001, no.51. - First posted 22 May 2013.