Live Auction 2829Old Master and 19th Century Art
Eglon van der Neer (Amsterdam 1635/6-1703 Düsseldorf)
Lot 63

Eglon van der Neer (Amsterdam 1635/6-1703 Düsseldorf)

A lady tuning a 'Luth Theorbé'

Closed13 October 2009

Price Realised

EUR 313,000

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Eglon van der Neer (Amsterdam 1635/6-1703 Düsseldorf)
A lady tuning a 'Luth Theorbé'
oil on panel
27.7 x 22.9 cm.

(Probably) Anonymous sale; Paillet, C.P. Boileau, Paris, 29 April 1790, lot 103, as 'Eglon van der Neer; Une belle femme hollandaise; elle est représentée assise et occupée à accorder sa guittarre, ce tableau, d'un beau fini, tant dans la partie des chairs, que dans celle des draperies, est aussi corect de dessin', support not mentioned, 27 x 23 cm. (260 livres).
(Probably) Anonymous sale; Lebrun, Baudoin, Paris, 4 April 1799, lot 50, as 'Eglon van der Neer; Une jeune femme, richement vêtue, vue à mi-corps, occupée à accorder sa guittarre: & divers accessoires, dont un tapis de Turquie', small panel (235 livres).
S. Herman de Zoete, Pickhurst Mead, Hayes; Christie's, London, 8 May 1885, lot 261, as 'Frans van Mieris; A lady playing a lute' (£36,15,0 to Colnaghi).
with Colnaghi, London.
(Presumably) Sir Francis Cook, 1st Bt., Visconde de Monserrate (1817-1901), and by descent in the Long Gallery (no. 287), Doughty House, Richmond, Surrey, to
Sir Herbert Cook, 3rd Bt. (1868-1939).
with David Katz, Basel and Dieren, from whom acquired by Dr. Hans Posse on 19 July 1940, for Dfl. 10.000, for the planned Führermuseum, Linz. Transferred to the Munich Central Collecting Point by Allied Forces in 1945 and subsequently restituted to David Katz in 1947.
David Katz; Sotheby's, London 21 June 1950, lot 92, as 'Frans van Mieris' (£850.00 to J.C. Whitbread).
Nathan Katz; Galerie Charpentier, Paris, 25 April 1951, lot 45, as 'Frans van Mieris: La jeune musicienne' (with partially incorrect provenance).
Anonymous sale; Palais Galleria, Paris, 26 March 1973, lot 28, as 'Frans van Mieris: La joueuse de guitare' (with partially incorrect provenance).
with Newhouse Galleries, New York, 1978, where acquired by the present owner.

Specialist note

Regarded since the nineteenth century as a work by Frans van Mieris, the re-attribution of this exquisite panel to Eglon van der Neer was first suggested only in 1981 by Otto Naumann (see literature). The picture belongs to a small group of works on the same theme executed by Van der Neer in the 1670s that together rank amongst the artist's finest and most admired pictures. These include the Lady tuning a Lute, signed and dated 1678 (Alte Pinakothek, Munich); the Lady playing a Mandolin, signed and dated 1677 (Staatliche Kunsthalle, Karlsruhe); and the Lady playing a Lute, signed and dated 1675 (sale, Christie's, New York, 6 April 2006, lot 46, $912,000).

We are grateful to Eddy Schavemaker for his assistance in the above catalogue entry. The picture will be included in his forthcoming catalogue raisonné on the artist.