RKD STUDIES

We now return to the Dutch painters who worked in Sweden. Rembrandt’s influence was slighter in Sweden than in the other Scandinavian countries. Other than Jürgen Ovens (1623-1678), no Rembrandt pupil travelled to Sweden, and Ovens only went there for a short while in 1654 to record the festivities of the marriage of Hedwig Eleonora von Holstein-Gottorf to Karl X Gustav (Gripsholm; Drottingholm Castle; Stockholm, Nationalmuseum) in a few paintings [1-3].¹ Other pictures by Ovens must have ended up in Stockholm on this occasion. Various members of the ducal house of Gottorf, painted by Ovens, decorated the walls of Hedwig Eleonora’s Gripsholm and Drottningholm castles [4].² However, Swedish envoys and officers also sought out the artist in Amsterdam, to be portrayed by him [5]. In 1652 Emanuel de Geer, who had inherited the Leufsta property from his father, also had himself portrayed by Ovens.³

1
Jürgen Ovens
Allegory on the crowning of Hedwig Eleonora of Schleswig-Holstein-Gottorf (1636-1715) as queen of Sweden by the goddess Minerva, dated August 1654
Stockholm, Nationalmuseum, inv./cat.nr. NMGrh 1222

The pictures of an indigenous artist, Johan Werner I (c. 1600-1656) look very old fashioned in contrast. Indeed, many of them still preserve compositional elements of the 16th century [6]. The portraits by Johan Werner II (c. 1630-1691) are still stiff and dignified, but well-painted in a Dutch sense [7].⁴

David Klöcker Ehrenstrahl (1629-1698), who hailed from Hamburg, studied in Amsterdam with his compatriot Juriaen Jacobsz (1624-c. 1685) before heading for Sweden and Queen-Dowager Maria Eleonora in 1651. In this brief period originated pictures in the Dutch style of a Nicolaes Maes or Johannes Mijtens, whereas during his second stay of 1661-1662, having visited Venice and Rome, he painted more in a French-oriented court style which does not entirely belie his Dutch background.⁵ His depiction of Wrangel’s Children Playing at Being Soldiers (1651; Skokloster) [8] and his Equestrian portrait of Count Carl Gurtaf Wrangel (1613-1676) [9] belong to the ‘Dutch’ pictures of the early 1650s.⁶ There are also Dutch-inspired still lifes and animal pictures in Göteborg [10] and at Drottningholm Castle which are derived from Henri de Fromentiou and Melchior d’Hondecoeter [11].

8
David Klöcker Ehrenstrahl
Playing children (Eleonora Sophia Wrangel af Salmis [1651-1678] and her brother Carl Philip), dated 1651
Uppsala (province), Skoklosters slott, inv./cat.nr. 551

Ehrenstrahl’s competitor was not only Wuchters, who stayed in Stockholm from 1660 to 1662, but especially Martin Mijtens I (1648-1736), a Hague portraitist who had worked for the Swedish court since 1677.⁷ He still paints with true Dutch realism, so that his works are often confused for ones by Ehrenstrahl. Naturally the portraits now become pompous and showy, like the late paintings by Ferdinand Bol, Jürgen Ovens, or Caspar Netscher (for example, Admiral Sjöblad and his wife, 1681/83 at Vibyholm; Rudbeck, 1696, Uppsala) [12-14].⁸

Johan Aureller I (1626-1696), Kaspar Kenckel (1650-1724) and Andreas von Behn (1650-1713) belong to the Dutch-schooled circle of Mijtens and Ehrenstrahl. In Von Behn's case, however, this is only partially true, as his history paintings from the late 17th century (Stockholm; sale Hammer, Cologne, 1895, no. 13) [15-16] adhere more to the Franco-Flemish style. Portraits of the 1670s and 1680s by Kenckel and Aureller on the contrary, are still purely Dutch in style and look like weak portraits by Nicolaes Maes or Jan de Baen [17-19].⁹

14
Martin Mijtens (I)
Portrait of anatomist and physician Olaus Rudbeck the Elder (1630-1702), dated 1696
Uppsala, Uppsala universitets konstsamlingar, inv./cat.nr. UU 230

The students of Martin Mytens, his son Martin van Meytens II (1695-1770) and nephew Georges Desmarées (1697-1752), who migrated to Vienna and Munich respectively, as well as Lucas von Breda I (1676-1752), the son of a Dutch merchant and a grandchild of Laurens van der Plas, freed themselves from all burdensome Dutch tradition. They are fine representative of the courtly French portrait style. Sometimes, as in a Self-Portrait by the young Meytens (Uffizi, Florence) [20], one believes one can still detect a little belated influence of the Dutch fijnschilders, just as with Johann Kupezky (1665/6-1740) and Balthasar Denner (1685-1749) one can be reminded just a little of the smooth light-dark effects of Frans van Mieris or Jan de Baen. In addition to French elegance, the early work of Desmarées show a clear and sober representation of reality inspired by Dutch models (example portrait Appelboom, Riddarhuset) [21]. In Germany, however, this influence quickly dissipates.

19
attributed to Kaspar Kenckel
Portrait of Oluf Rudbeck the Elder (1630-1702), 1687
Stockholm, Nationalmuseum, inv./cat.nr. NMGrh 2627