1.3 Carl Gustaf Wrangel
Field Marshal Count Carl Gustaf Wrangel (1613-1676) was a Maecenas in a general’s uniform.1 He became Governor General of Pomerania in 1648. Arnold Houbraken (1660-1719) informs us that Wrangel had himself portrayed in Bremen by Christoffel Pierson (1631-1714) and Bartholomeus Meyburgh (1624/5-1708/9), and that he tried in vain to attract these two artists to the Swedish court.2 Wrangel’s wife was portrayed by Anselm van Hulle (1601-1674/80) [1], for whom Chancellor Oxenstierna's son also sat in 1648, the year of the Peace of Westphalia [2].3
Wrangel’s ‘court portraitist’ was Matthäus Merian II (1621-1687), and the general eventually owned fifty pictures by him. His own portrait existed in three versions [3-5], while the others depicted his officers [6]. Like most of Merian’s works of his early period, these portraits are entirely Dutch in style, as can be verified by a perusal of the collection of Baron Rutger von Essen (1914-1977) (formerly Count Brahe) in Skokloster. That happens to be where the greater part of Wrangel’s commissions and plundered property is preserved.4
From one of his military campaigns, Wrangel brought back a portrait of Christian, Duke of Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel (1599-1626), known as ‘der tolle Halberstädter’, which was a copy of a picture by Van Mierevelt [7]. In the von Essen Collection we still find various Dutch portraits by Anselm van Hulle [1] and Joachim von Sandrart I (1606-1688) [8],5 as well as history paintings by Simon Peter Tilman (1601-1668), Claes Moeyaert (1591-1655), Isaac Isaacsz,6 Salomon Koninck (1609-1656) and Adriaen van Nieulandt (c. 1586/87-1658) [9-14]. These works decorated Christian IV’s beautiful Kronborg Castle until Wrangel expropriated them when Kronborg fell to the Swedes in 1658.
1
Anselm van Hulle
Portrait of Anna Margareta von Haugwitz, wife of Carl Gustav Wrangel, c. 1649-1650
Uppsala (province), Skoklosters slott
2
Pieter de Jode (II) after Anselm van Hulle
Portrait of Count Johan Axelson Oxenstierna of Södermöre (1611-1657), dated 1648
Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum, inv./cat.nr. RP-P-1906-1270
3
Matthäus Merian (II)
Portrait of Count Carl Gustav Wrangel (1613-1676), dated 1662
Uppsala (province), Skoklosters slott, inv./cat.nr. 1730
4
Matthäus Merian (II)
Portrait of Count Carl Gustaf Wrangel (1613-1676), dated 1652
Gripsholms Slott (Mariefred), National Portrait Gallery at Gripsholm Castle
5
Melchior Küsel (I) after Matthäus Merian (II)
Portrait of Count Carl Gustaf Wrangel (1613-1676), 1640-1675
London (England), British Museum, inv./cat.nr. Bb, 4.196
6
Matthäus Merian (II)
Portrait of General Major Georg Friedrich Öffner († after1686), 1662
Uppsala (province), Skoklosters slott, inv./cat.nr. 3076
7
after Michiel van Mierevelt
Portrait of Christian von Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel (1599-1626), bishop of Halberstadt, c. 1623
Uppsala (province), Skoklosters slott
8
Joachim von Sandrart (I)
Equestrian portrait of King Karl X Gustav of Sweden (1622-1660), dated 1650
Uppsala (province), Skoklosters slott, inv./cat.nr. 616
9
Simon Peter Tilman free after Simon de Passe
The Cimbrians defeating the Romans, dated 1641
Stockholm, Nationalmuseum, inv./cat.nr. NM 4576
10
Simon Peter Tilman after Simon de Passe
Pagan procession, dated 1641
Stockholm, Nationalmuseum, inv./cat.nr. NM 4573
11
Claes Moeyaert
The funeral of the heathen king Harald Gormson Blåtand, dated 1643
Uppsala (province), Skoklosters slott, inv./cat.nr. 3633
12
Isaac Isaacsz.
Harold Klak is received by Emperor Ludwig in 826, dated 1640
Uppsala (province), Skoklosters slott, inv./cat.nr. 1954
13
Salomon Koninck
The royal double betrothals or nupitials of 1502, c. 1642
Uppsala (province), Skoklosters slott, inv./cat.nr. 1955
14
Adriaen van Nieulandt
Radulph outwits the Wends at Roskilde, dated 1643
Uppsala (province), Skoklosters slott, inv./cat.nr. 1953
A series of nine depictions from the life of Ragnar Lodbrok, which Gerard van Honthorst (1592-1656) had painted in [and before] 1643 and which emerged in the early 19th century as the property of one De la Gardie, were undoubtedly also removed from Kronborg in 1658 [15-24].7
15
Gerard van Honthorst
King Frode Fredegod of Denmark hailed by many kings, c. 1640
Helsingør, Kronborg Slot, inv./cat.nr. 428
16
Peter van Lint
The coronation of King Hans in Stockholm in 1497
Private collection
17
Gerard van Honthorst
Harald Klak and his family are baptized in Mainz, c. 1640
Private collection
18
Gerard van Honthorst
King Albrecht hands over the Swedish crown to Queen Margaret I in 1389, c. 1640
Helsingør, Kronborg Slot
19
Gerard van Honthorst
Cavalry battle, dated 1643
Drottningholm, Drottningholm Slott
20
Gerard van Honthorst
Fridlev, the son of King Frode III, kills a dragon, c. 1640
Private collection
21
Gerard van Honthorst
Fight between the Cimbri and the Romans near a bridge, c. 1640
Private collection
22
Gerard van Honthorst
Christian I meets prince Maximilian at Rothenburg ob der Tauber in 1474, dated 1643
Private collection
23
Gerard van Honthorst
King Hans at the battle of Rotebro before Stockholm in 1497, c. 1640
Helsingør, Kronborg Slot, inv./cat.nr. 423
24
Gerard van Honthorst
Frederik I at the siege in Copenhagen in 1523, c. 1640
Helsingør, Kronborg Slot
25
Willem van de Velde (I)
The naval battle near Fehmarn (1644), c. 1652
Uppsala (province), Skoklosters slott, inv./cat.nr. 1674
26
Willem van de Velde (I)
Battle at Fehmarn (1644), c. 1652
Uppsala (province), Skoklosters slott, inv./cat.nr. 1675
However, one would do the General Field Marshall an injustice if one were to believe that he assembled his collections only through conquest and military campaigns. We know, for instance, that he commissioned Willem van de Velde I (c. 1611-1693) to record the battle of Fehmarn (Von Essen collection, Skokloster) [25-26].8 In 1651 he acquired various Dutch pictures from the Swedish envoy Harald Appelboom (1612-1674) in Amsterdam, including a winter scene by Jan Steen (1625/6-1679) which is of great art-historical interest on account of this early date [27].9
27
Jan Steen
Winter landscape, c. 1650
Uppsala (province), Skoklosters slott
Notes
1 [Van Leeuwen/Roding 2024] Eimer 1961 gives a good survey of Wrangel’s building activities. See also Noldus 2004.
2 [Gerson 1942/1983] Houbraken 1718-1721, vol. 2, p. 260-261. [Van Leeuwen/Roding 2024] Horn/van Leeuwen 2021, vol. 2, p. 260-261. Actually, Houbraken mentions Bremervörde, not Bremen; Bremervörde is c. 65 km north-east of Bremen.
3 [Gerson 1942/1983] Granberg 1911-1913, vol. 1 (1911), nos. 35-36. On Wrangel’s collection: Granberg 1929-1932, vol. 2 (1930), p. 46-56. [Van Leeuwen/Roding 2024] No image was available of the full-lenght portrait of Count Johan Axelsson Oxenstierna (1611-1657) of 1648, 2.10 x 1.37 cm; Granberg lists its whereabouts as the collection of countess Stéphanie von Wedel, née Hamilton, Stora Sundby (Granberg 1911, no. 36). We assume that the engraving (fig. 2) was made after this portrait.
4 [Gerson 1942/1983] Granberg 1911-1913, vol. 1 (1911), nos. 182-225.
5 [Van Leeuwen/Roding 2024] Gerson probably overestimated the ‘Dutch’ impact on the portraits by Van Hulle and Sandrart. Both of the portraits he refers to were painted in Nuremberg on commission by Wrangel.
6 [Gerson 1942/1983] Granberg 1911-1913, vol. 1 (1911), p. 100, no. 450-452. [Van Leeuwen/Roding 2024] Nos. 451 and 452, listed by Granberg as Isaac Isaacsz, are works by Salomon Koninck and Adriaen van Nieulandt.
7 [Gerson 1942/1983] Granberg 1911-1913, vol. 1 (1911), p. 102-104, nos. 456-464. See also Gerson 1942/1983, p. 458 [Gerson/Van Leeuwen/Roding et al. 2015, § 2.7, with an overview of the series]. [Van Leeuwen/Roding 2024] The Kronborg paintings were divided between Magnus Gabriel De la Gardie (1622-1686), who took most works by Honthorst, and Carl Gustaf Wrangel, who carried off paintings by the above mentioned Nicolaes Moeyaert, Isaacs Isaacsz, Salomon Koninck, Simon Peter Tilman and Adriaen van Nieulandt (Schepelern/Houkjær 1988, p. 20). The paintings by Honthorst are not a separate series, as Gerson seems to suggest, neither do they represent the ‘Life of Ragnar Lodbrok’. The Kronborg series, of which 17 survive today, represent scenes from Danish history. Gerson quotes the nine works listed under Honthorst in Granberg 1911-1913, vol. 1 (1911), p. 102-104, nos. 456-464. However, one of them, no. 462, is now given to Peter van Lint (fig. 16), of which no image was known at the time. Most works of the series remained in Sweden but three paintings by Honthorsts have returned to Kronborg (fig, 15, 23 and 24). A fourth Honthorst (RKDimages 236374) was not kept at Kronborg in 1658: it is the only work of the series that was not carried of to Sweden.
8 [Gerson 1942/1983] Granberg 1911-1913, vol. 1 (1911), nos. 273-274. [Van Leeuwen/Roding 2024] For a reconstruction on the course of events regarding the commission, which in fact largely failed: Daalder 2020, p. 103-113. The commission went through art agent Michiel le Blon (1587-1658). Initially, Wrangel wanted a large painting of the 1644 naval battle by Simon de Vlieger, but the latter was insufficiently familiar with the details of the ships and history of the naval battle, which had been observed by Van de Velde himself. A third drawing (the final phase of the sea battle) may have been made but was lost. Van de Velde's ultimate goal was presumably the delivery of three paintings. There are also indications that the drawings would be designs for a series of four tapestries (Hartkamp-Jonxis 2006, p. 65-67). However, the commission went no further than the delivery of two (or three) large drawings.
9 [Gerson 1942/1983] Granberg 1907; Stechow 1928-1929, p. 173-174; Granberg 1911-1913, vol. 1 (1911), no. 421. [Van Leeuwen/Roding 2024] On Harald Appelboom as a cultural agent: Noldus 2004, p. 105-108 and Opschoor 2020.