Jan Lievens: A Preview
A Dutch Master Rediscovered in 130 Works at Three Museums
More than 130 paintings, drawings and prints are included in the exhibition "Jan Lievens: A Dutch Master Rediscovered" at three art museums in 2008 and 2009.
Jan Lievens: A Dutch Master Rediscovered is a scholarly reassessment of the life and enigmatic career of the 17th-century artist. After Lievens' death, the misattribution of many of his works to his contemporaries, including Rembrandt van Rijn (1606-1669), led to the painter having fallen into relative obscurity. The international loan exhibition of more than 130 paintings, drawings and prints by Lievens will be on view at the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. (October 26, 2008-January 11, 2009), the Milwaukee Art Museum in Wisconsin (February 7-April 26, 2009) and the Rembrandthuis in Amsterdam, The Netherlands (May 17-August 9, 2009).
Lievens' Career and Influences
Painter and draftsman Jan Lievens (1607-1674) was born in Leiden, The Netherlands. Precocious in his youth, he was apprenticed to a local Dutch painter at eight years of age and then to the Amsterdam master Pieter Lastman (1583-1633). At twelve, Lievens embarked on his artistic career.
Lievens' dramatic half-length figure paintings from the mid-1620s reflect the influence of Utrecht's Caravaggisti, followers of the Italian Barique painter Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio (1571-1610). These historicizing portraits feature Lievens' sitters in antique or biblical scenes. During the same period, Lievens enjoyed a close friendship with Rembrandt van Rijn (1606-1669), also a graduate of Lastman's atelier. The young artists collaborated on a number of paintings while they lived in Leiden until about 1632. Their association led art historians to portray Lievens incorrectly as Rembrandt's student when, in point of fact, he appears to have initiated many of the stylistic innovations prevalent in both artists' works in the late 1620s.
From 1632 to 1644, Lievens lived and painted primarily in England and Antwerp, where he was influenced by the bright palette and elegant compositions of the Flemish Baroque painters Anthony van Dyck (1599-1641) and Peter Paul Rubens (1577-1640). Upon his return to Holland in 1644, the popular Lievens secured important civic and private commissions in Amsterdam, The Hague and Berlin. Despite his successes, the artist was plagued by constant financial problems. Lievens died in Amsterdam in 1674.
Reassessing Lievens' Works
There are several reasons for Lievens' reputation having been eclipsed by his 17th-century contemporaries until recently. The fact that he was itinerant between London and Antwerp (1632-1644) has confounded art historians in their attempts to document the period and his regional styles. A large number of Lievens' paintings are lost and many of his surviving large-scale compositions are accessible to only a handful of scholars. The exhibition includes works currently reattributed to the master as well as others recently discovered, thus providing the viewer with a more complete survey of the artist's career.
Overview of the Exhibition
The works in Jan Lievens: A Dutch Master Rediscovered are arranged chronologically. Among some 54 oil paintings are view are:
- Leiden's youthful and expressive Self-Portrait (ca. 1629-1630);
- The Cardplayers (ca. 1623-1624);
- The Feast of Esther (ca. 1625), an example of the Caravaggisti's influence;
- Youth Embracing a Young Woman (ca. 1627-1628); and
- Job in His Misery (1631).
One highlight of the show is the artist's Prince Charles Louis with His Tutor, as the Young Alexander Instructed by Aristotle (1631) from the J. Paul Getty Museum. Painted for the king and queen of Bohemia, the nearly square oil on canvas historical portrait features the fancifully attired German Prince Charles Louis of the Palatinate being instructed by the wise Wolrad von Plessen, his accomplished mentor. The elderly teacher wears a gold medallion and gently extends his right hand over a open voluminous text in front of his adolescent student. The youth, wearing a yellow robe with an intricately embroidered cape, looks off into the distance and has been caught apparently daydreaming by von Plessen. Originally thought to be a 17th-century interpretation of the biblical Eli instructing Samuel, scholars now concur that Lievens' sensitive composition is a deliberate allusion to the young Alexander the Great being taught by the philosopher Aristotle.
Also on display are 78 of Jan Lievens' drawings and prints, among them:
- The Raising of Lazarus (1630-1631);
- Portrait of an Elderly Man (ca. 1635-1635);
- Village Street with a Windmill (ca. 1650s); and
- the bucolic pen and ink Forest Interior with a Draftsman (1650s?).
The exhibition and its catalogue reestablish Jan Lievens as a major creative force in 17th-century Dutch painting, his brilliant reputation salvaged from the sometimes mirky annals of art history.
Source:
- Wheelock, Arthur (ed.), et al. Jan Lievens: A Dutch Master Rediscovered (exh. cat.). Washington, D.C.: National Gallery of Art, 2008.
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