In short

Our magnificent landscape painting is an important discovery: Klaus Ertz has identified it as an early work by David Vinckboons, painted after a now lost composition by Gills van Coninxloo II. In his early twenties Vinckboons is known to have assisted van Coninxloo, by painting for him the figure staffage.

This painting is one of the major testimonies of how the Flemish late Mannerist panoramic landscape tradition made its way up North to Holland, to Amsterdam, through Gillis van Coninxloo II circa 1600.

Thirty-five years ago our painting was sold at auction for well over 200.000 € as an original composition by Gillis van Coninxloo II himself.

About David Vinckboons I

Dutch painter of Flemish origin
Mechelen (Malines)1576 – 1632 Amsterdam

Important painter, draughtsman and engraver of landscapes, peasant scenes and genre scenes.

Vinckboons was the son and pupil of Philip I (1545 – 1601), who was a water colour painter. In his turn David I was the master of his two sons, Philips II (1607/08 – 1678) and David II (1622/23 – 1679). He also had other, more important pupils: Hendrick Avercamp, Gillis Claesz. de Hondecoeter, Jacques van der Wyhen and probably Esaias van de Velde.

Soon after David’s birth, in 1579, his father moved with his family from Mechelen to Antwerp. When David was ten years old they moved again in 1586 to Middelburg in Zeeland where they stayed until 1591, when they finally settled in Amsterdam. David remained here all his life.

Although David I must have received a Protestant education he married a Catholic woman, the daughter of a rich notary, in 1602 in Leeuwarden. Their children (probably ten) received a Catholic education. 

David’s son Philips II (1607/08 – 1678) painted at least until 1637, but he finally became an important architect in Amsterdam. He is said to have been the inventor of the typical Amsterdam narrow Classicist canal house. 

About Gillis van Coninxloo II

Flemish painter
Antwerp 1544 – 1606 Amsterdam

Important landscape painter.

Son of Jan van Coninxloo.

According to Karel van Mander Gillis studied in Antwerp under Pieter Coecke van Aelst (1527 – 1559), later under a certain Lenaert Kroes and finally under Gillis Mostaert (circa 1534 – 1598).

He became a member of the Painter’s Guild of Saint Luke in Antwerp in 1570.

In 1585, following its reconquest under Alessandro Farnese, van Coninxloo fled Antwerp because of the persecution of Protestants by the Spanish Catholics. First he travelled to the nearby province of Zeeland. As so many compatriots he left for Frankenthal (in 1587) in the Protestant German state of the Palatinate (‘Palts’) in Middle Germany, between Heidelberg and Worms. Frankenthal became an important ‘Flemish’ art centre, with van Coninxloo as its most important painter. Around 1600 half of its population was of Flemish origin.

Gillis van Coninxloo II left Frankenthal in 1595 for Amsterdam, where he died in 1606 (he was buried January 4^th 1607 in the ‘Nieuwe Kerk’).

Van Coninxloo is a highly important landscape painter whose artistic production can be divided in two:

- his fictitious panoramic landscapes from his Frankenthal period;
- his realistic, dense forest landscapes from his Amsterdam years, in which the human figures are almost crushed by and lost among the tall trees.

Van Coninxloo played a crucial role in the transfer of Flemish landscape traditions to Holland, in his case to Amsterdam. Through his paintings, but also through engravings made after them, he became a much- admired painter and an influential teacher. 

Among his pupils in Amsterdam are probably Hercules Seghers and Esaias van de Velde.

His paintings are rare. A lot of early 17^th century wooded landscapes have in the past been wrongly attributed to him.

About our painting

This is a traditional late Mannerist, panoramic landscape from the circa 1600:
- these wide panoramic views were completely fictitious inventions, based on a multitude of real observations, that give an overview of all possible landscape motives: hills, mountains, forests, lakes, rivers, towns, farms, all brought together in one synthetic, but detailed overview, painted with a delightful brushwork and a rich colour palette with a lot of sense for atmospheric conditions.
- the trees on both sides of the composition and the dark foreground serve as a framing devise, leading our view into the painting;
- the landscape itself is divided in several distinct shots traditionally divided over the brown foreground, green middle distance and blue background. The technical name for this perspective system is ‘coulisse landscape’, referring to the drapes and curtains used on a theatre stage.
- the viewpoint of the painter and the horizon line are high, so that a maximum of shots can be combined.
- the historical, in this case Biblical subject lifts the landscape to a higher spiritual level.

The subject in the foreground is the rescue by Pharao’s daughter of baby Moses floating in a small basket from the reeds along the river Nile. During the Egyptian captivity Pharao had decided to have all male Jewish babies killed. Moses’ mother had been hiding him for three months until she placed the infant in the basket along the bank of the Nile. The princess had come to the river to bath with her maidens. Her servant in the foreground pulls the child out of the water. The princess adopted Moses and he received a royal Egyptian education.

According to Dr. Klaus Ertz this painting was painted by David Vinckboons at an early age after a now lost original by Gillis van Coninxloo II. He had already published the painting in 1987, P.8, Nr. 2 in “Paysages et Saisons: aspect de l’art néerlandais du 17ème siècle”.

That composition is today also known through an engraving by Nicolaes de Bruyn from 1601 and through several painted versions by less qualified painters. Young Vinckboons is known to have assisted van Coninxloo; he painted the figure staffage in several of his paintings. As to Vinckboons’s own paintings, he always painted the figures himself, he did not use a separate staffage painter for it. His early, still Mannerist figures, such as ours, are long and slender with small heads; they are very different from his later style from circa 1610 onwards, when they received rounder faces.

Our painting fetched 1.500.000 FF (228.673 €) April 14^th 1988 at a sale by Ader Picard Tajan at the Hôtel George V in Paris, when it was sold as by Gillis van Coninxloo III (in those days there reigned a confusion between Gillis II and III; our Gillis II was then called Gillis III) to Galerie de Jonckheere (Paris/Brussels)

It fetched 700.000 FF (106.720 €) November 22^nd 1999 when it was sold at the Hôtel Drouot in Paris by Rieunier, Bailly Pommery, Desbuisson as ‘Circle of Gillis van Coninxloo’.

David’s early landscape show the influence of Pieter Brueghel I (1526/30 – 1569), of Gillis van Conincxloo II (1544 – 1607) and of the School of Frankenthal (which also forms a Flemish, Protestant link between Antwerp and Amsterdam). In 1607 Vinckboons bought a lot of drawings by van Conincxloo at his estate’s sale in Amsterdam. His peasant scenes were influenced by Hans Bol (1534 – 1593) and by Jacob Savery (circa 1665/67 – 1603/04). David’s mature style was influenced by Sir Peter Paul Rubens’ heroic landscapes. 

As Prof.-Dr. Jan De Maere states in his “Illustrated Dictionary” (1994, P. 411) about David Vinckboons I: “These early landscapes differ from those of G. van Conincxloo by virtue of their romantic atmosphere which creates a perfect harmony between mountainous backgrounds and wooded landscapes.”

Why should you buy this painting?

Because it is a true masterpiece from the late Mannerist period dating from circa 1600.