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Landscape with a town in the background, in the right foreground a group of pigs watched by a parent and child

Maker

(artist)
c. 1566-1603

Formerly attributed to
(artist)
1525-1569

Title

Date of Production

1590-1600

Medium

traces of black chalk (visible under microscope), pen and brown ink on laid paper, with brown ink framing lines largely trimmed away, laid down on a historic backing paper

Dimensions

Height: 14.5 cm
Width: 19 cm

Accession Number

D.1978.PG.316

Mode of Acquisition

Count Antoine Seilern, bequest, 1978

Credit

The Courtauld, London (Samuel Courtauld Trust)

Copyright

Work in the public domain

Location

Not currently on display

Keywords

Label Text

A swineherd surveys his livestock on a hill overlooking a town. Jacob Savery uses delicate modelling to describe the surrounding northern European countryside. Such landscapes by Jacob were once considered part of a consistent group representing Pieter Bruegel the Elder’s style in the 1560s. However, in 1986, around twenty-five of these were shown to be forgeries made two decades after Bruegel’s death. The quantity produced is demonstrative of a lucrative enterprise.

Provenance

sale at Hôtel Drouot (Paris), 1874; acquired there by a friend of Dr E.S., Aveyron, France and given to him, and still with him in 1950 [according to Michel 1950, p. 121]; Otto Wertheimer, Galerie les Tourettes (Paris); acquired there by Count Antoine Seilern (1901-1978), April 1955; Princes Gate Bequest 1978

Exhibition History

Drawings Gallery Display - Bruegel / Not Bruegel, The Courtauld Gallery, London, 16/01/2016-17/04/2016

Literature

Mielke, Hans, Pieter Bruegel: die Zeichnungen, Turnhout 1996
no. A 31 on p. 81
as Jacob Savery; in file

Seilern, Count Antoine, Flemish paintings and drawings at 56 Princes Gate, London SW7. Addenda, London 1969; IV
no. 316
pl. XXIX
as Bruegel, dated 1560; in file

Münz, Ludwig, Bruegel: the drawings, London 1961
no. 34 on p. 212 and p. 18
pl. 33 ...More

de Tolnay, Charles, The drawings of Pieter Bruegel the elder: with a critical catalogue, London 1952
Addenda no. 3 on p. 95

Michel, Edouard, 'Un dessin inédit de Pierre Bruegel le Vieux' [or 'Bruegel et la Critique moderne?] in 'Gazette des Beaux-Arts', 1950; XXXVII
pp. 121-24
fig. 1
The whole article is about this drawing, which Michel says he studied while in the collection of a Dr E.S. from Aveyron, who had acquired the drawing through a friend at the Hotel Drouot sale in 1874. He agrees unreservedly with the Bruegel attribution. ...Less

Inscriptions

Watermark: Historic backing paper, verso, lower left: lower half of an eagle holding a shield (matches Briquet 6164 - Traburg 1590; per Spicer 1970, this paper was produced in Salzburg, possibly by Jacques Sichelschmied, active by 1568, and occurs on backing sheets for Bruegel drawings as well as on 2 drawings in Besancon thought to be by Roelandt Savery).

Inscription: Recto: lower right corner, brown ink, false signature and date (same on PG.12): "P.BRVEGEL 1560".

Collector's mark: none.

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