It’s the sort of minute an art dealership lives for: the discovery of an uncommon work stashed in an otherwise typical selection of auction lots. Even rarer still is revealing an enormously underestimated illustration by a Dutch master that had not been found in 132 years. That’s precisely the backstory of how Christopher Bishop got his hands on an illustration by 17th-century painter Jan Lievens from a little Massachusetts auction home in 2020, where it was at first valued in between $200 and $300. By the end of this month, it might bring someplace in the area of $1.44 million back in Lievens’s homeland, the Netherlands.
The work is an official picture of Maarten Tromp, the leader of the Dutch Navy, who sat for the artist just a year prior to his death in a sea fight with the English. Over the centuries because, Tromp has actually been an icon of nationwide pride in the Netherlands, even appearing on Dutch postage stamps while the nation was under Nazi profession at the height of The second world war.
As befits an important piece stuck in obscurity, the life of this Lievens illustration has actually been an intriguing one. Initially utilized as the basis for oil paintings of Tromp, the illustration was the structure for print recreations, as it reveals proof of having actually been pinned onto an inscribing plate. The ownership of this specific illustration was last revealed at an 1888 auction in Frankfurt, with its location in between then and 2020 rather unidentified.
Thinking about that a 2nd Lievens illustration of Tromp and an oil painting based upon this specific illustration being in the British Museum’s collection, it’s a secret regarding how it stayed unaccounted for for so long. Nevertheless, Christopher Bishop’s mid-pandemic digging through online auctions led him to the illustration, noted as “an unknown gentleman, initialed I.L., and outdated 1652” by Marion Antique Auction Home.
Bishop’s understanding that a J typically looked like an I in 17th-century signatures offered him an inkling that he was onto something unique. That suspicion was quickly verified by the flurry of interest in the run-up to the October 2020 auction. With 15 prospective bidders, the rate soared to $514,800 when all was stated and done, even if Bishop wasn’t 100% sure that he ‘d bought an authentic work when the gavel struck.
