Jacob van Ruisdael

Possibly Louis-Marie Lebas Courmont (1742–1794), Paris, 1792 (according to C. Hofstede de Groot);

Probably Colonel Biré, Brussels;

M. Héris, Brussels (probably as an agent for Colonel Biré);

By whom sold, Bonnefons and Paillet, Paris, 25–26 March 1841, lot 20, for 6,750 fr.;¹

Tardieu Collection;

Their sale, Hôtel des Ventes, Paris, 4 February 1851, lot 19;

Where acquired by Etienne Leroy for 5,800 fr.;

Théodore Patureau (1798-1876), Paris;

His sale, Hôtel Drouot, Paris, 20–21 April 1857, lot 29;

Where acquired by M. Verboen for 9,700 fr.;

Maurice Kann (1840-1891), Paris;

August Cornelius de Ridder (1837-1911), Villa Schönberg, Cronberg-im-Taunus;

With Kleinberger Galleries, Paris and New York, 1911;

Marcus Kappel (1839-1920), Berlin, by 1914;

Thence by inheritance to his grandson, Dr. Gerhart Noah (1898-1931), Berlin;

Thence by inheritance to his cousins, Ernst (later Ernest) G. Rathenau (1898-1986)) and Ellen Ettlinger (née Rathenau, 1902-1994), Berlin and from 1938 New York and Oxfordshire respectively;

Transferred in trust to Dr. F.J. Sedlmayr, pursuant to a family agreement of 1939 (the painting remained in storage at Deutsche Bank);

Seized by German authorities in Amsterdam and subsequently acquired through the Dienststelle Mühlmann for the proposed Führermuseum, Linz (inv. no. 1436; recorded 15 February 1941 or possibly 27 October 1940);

Recovered by the Allies and registered at the Munich Central Collecting Point on 15 July 1945 (MCCP no. 4336);

Repatriated to the Netherlands on 19 March 1946;

Stichting Nederlands Kunstbezit (SNK), inv. no. 621;

Returned in 1947 to Ernest G. Rathenau, New York, and his sister Ellen Ettlinger (née Rathenau), Oxford, in 1947, although not formally received and signed for by them until 19 March 1951, together with Jan van der Heyden's View of Amsterdam with the Westerkerk, possibly following exhibition;

Sold by their heirs to Otto Naumann, New York;

With Noortman Master Paintings, Maastricht;

From whom acquired by a private collector, 2004;

By whom sold ("The Property of a Private Collector"), Sotheby's, London, 5 December 2018, lot 13;

Where acquired by the present collector.

^{1 The catalogue of this sale bears the title Catalogue d'une riche collection de tableaux des écoles flamande et hollandaise, recueillie par M. Héris de Bruxelles..., but although the collection was "recueillie" (collected/gathered) by Héris and was offered for sale under his name, he may not himself have been the owner of the paintings. In the copy of the sale catalogue at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the words "Recueillie par M. Héris de Bruxelles" in the title are followed by the handwritten addition, "pour M. le Colonel Biré," and alongside the title in the Victoria and Albert Museum's copy is written "mais c'est la collection de M. le Colonel Biré," which suggests that Héris may have been acting as Biré's agent in acquiring and selling the pictures.}

Paris, Jeu de Paume, Exposition des Grands et Petits Maîtres Hollandais du XVIIe Siècle, 28 April - 10 July 1911, no. 137 (lent by F. Kleinberger);

Berlin, Königlichen Akademie der Künste (Royal Academy of Arts), Werken alter Kunst aus dem Privatbesitz von Mitgliedern des Kaiser Friedrich-Museums-Vereins, May 1914, no. 147 (lent by Marcus Kappel);

Washington, D.C., National Gallery of Art; Buffalo, Albright Art Gallery; New Haven, Yale University Art Gallery; Northampton, Mass., The Smith College Museum of Art; Worcester, Mass., Worcester Art Museum; Williamstown, Mass., Williams College; Philadelphia, The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts; New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art; Newark, N.J., The Newark Museum; Kansas City, Mo., William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Atkins Museum of Fine Arts; San Francisco, The California Palace of the Legion of Honor; Ann Arbor, Mich., University of Michigan; Baltimore, The Walters Art Gallery, Pictures Looted from Holland by the Nazis, Returned Through the Efforts of the U.S. Armed Forces, 7 December 1946 - 1 January 1948, no. 35;

New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art, long-term loan, 1951-1995 (inv. no. L.51.35.2, lent by Ernest G. Rathenau and Ellen Rathenau Ettlinger);

London, National Gallery, long-term loan, 2019.

Jeu de Paume, Exposition des Grands et Petits Maîtres Hollandais du XVIIe Siècle, exhibition catalogue, Paris 1911, p. 24, cat. no. 137;

W. Martin, "Ausstellung altholländischer Bilder in Pariser Privatbesitz," in Monatshefte für Kunstwissenschaft 4, no. 11 (1911), p. 506 (as not by Ruisdael);

Kleinberger Galleries, A Descriptive and Illustrated Catalogue of 150 Paintings by Old Masters...from the Kleinberger Galleries, Paris/New York 1911, pp. 80-81, cat. no. 63, reproduced;

C. Hofstede de Groot, A Catalogue Raisonné of the Works of the Most Eminent Dutch Painters of the Seventeenth Century, vol. IV, London 1912, p. 35, cat. no. 88 (as Ruisdael, the figures ascribed to Adriaen van de Velde);

W. von Bode (ed.), Die Gemäldesammlung Marcus Kappel in Berlin, Berlin 1914, n.p., cat. no. 27 (as Ruisdael, the staffage by Adriaen van de Velde);

Kaiser-Friedrich-Museums-Verein, Ausstellung von Werken alter Kunst aus dem Privatbesitz von Mitgliedern des Kaiser Friedrich-Museums-Vereins, exhibition catalogue, Berlin 1914, p. 39, cat. no. 147;

J. Rosenberg, Jacob van Ruisdael, Berlin 1928, p. 75, cat. no. 42 (as Ruisdael, the figures by Lingelbach);

Kunst dem Volk 6 (20 April 1944), pp. 8, 10, reproduced;

Paintings Looted from Holland, Returned through the Efforts of the United States Armed Forces, exhibition catalogue, New York 1946, p. 19, no. 35;

J. Giltay, "De tekeningen van Jacob van Ruisdael," in Oud Holland 94, no. 2/3 (1980), p. 161 (probably doubtful as by Ruisdael);

S. Slive, Jacob van Ruisdael, exhibition catalogue, New York 1981, p. 219, under cat. no. 88 (as by Ruisdael, not sharing Giltay's doubts regarding the attribution);

J.L. Edwards, Expert et Marchand de tableaux à la fin du 18e siècle, Alexandre-Joseph Paillet, Paris 1996, p. 282;

S. Slive, Jacob van Ruisdael: A Complete Catalogue of his Paintings, Drawings, and Etchings, New Haven/London 2001, pp. 84, 543 under. cat. no. D67, 621, cat. no. dub20, reproduced (under "dubious and wrongly attributed paintings");

S. Slive, Jacob van Ruisdael: Master of Landscape, exhibition catalogue, New Haven/London 2005, p. 220, under cat. no. 91.