Gerrit van Honthorst (1590 - 1656)
Lot 178: Gerrit van Honthorst , Utrecht 1590 - 1656 Portrait of Charles I oil on canvas
Sotheby's
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Description
quarter length, wearing a striped doublet with garter sash and lace ruff oil on canvas
Dimensions
measurements note 46 by 40.5 cm., 18 by 16 in.
Provenance
Anonymous sale, Robinson & Foster, 1948, as Van Dyck, Portrait of a Cavalier, bt. by Edward Farmer
Notes
This portrait is one of two versions, the other is now in the National Portrait Gallery. Bought by Edward Farmer, a painter from Watford, in 1948, this painting is believed to have been damaged during the Second World War and subsequently reduced in size from 27 by 23 in. to 18 by 16 in. It would have originally depicted the King seated at a desk, holing a letter, as in the other portrait. The present painting differs from the National Portrait Gallery version in the colouring of the sitters doublet and was thought by David Piper, when he saw it, to be the ad vivum version (see memorandum of 17th August, 1966 at NPG). Honthorst came to England only between April and December 1628, at the instigation of the Duke of Buckingham. During this time he was chiefly employed executing the enormous commission for the painting of Charles I and Henrietta Maria as Apollo and Diana recieving the liberal Arts who are introduced by Buckingham (Royal Collection, Hampton Court). It must have been during this period at the English Court that he also executed this charming and intimate image of the King.
Old Master and Early British Paintings
bySotheby's
London, United Kingdom
