oil on panel, oval panel: 25 x 22,5 cm
signed and dated: ‘163(7)? CS’
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Notes
Cornelis Saftleven was a Dutch painter who worked in a great variety of genres. Known in particular for his rural genre scenes, his range of subjects was very wide and included portraits, farmhouse interiors, rural and beach scenes, landscapes with cattle, history paintings, scenes of Hell, allegories, satires and illustrations of proverbs.
Cornelis Saftleven was born into a family of artists. He learned to paint from his father Herman, along with his brothers Abraham and Herman Saftleven the Younger. He lived for a time in Utrecht with his brother.
After training in Rotterdam, Cornelis likely travelled to Antwerp around 1632. Rubens is known to have added figures in paintings of Saftleven before 1637. When Rubens died in 1640 there were eight Saftleven paintings in his collection, four of which with figures added by Rubens.
Among his earliest works are portraits and peasant interiors influenced by Adriaen Brouwer. By 1634 Cornelis was in Utrecht, where his brother Herman Saftleven the Younger was living. The brothers began painting stable interiors, a new subject in peasant genre painting.
By 1637 Cornelis had returned to Rotterdam. He became dean of the guild of Saint Luke of Rotterdam in 1667. His pupils included Abraham Hondius, Ludolf de Jongh and Egbert Lievensz. van der Poel. Approximately two hundred of Saftleven’s oil paintings and five hundred of his drawings still survive. So to find this small and intimitae portrait by Saftleven is rare.
Provenance: