Portrait
Gustave Courbet (1819 - 1877), c. 1849-1863
oil on canvas, 54.6 cm x 45.4 cm
Credits: The Mesdag Collection, The Hague
Is this a portrait or a self-portrait? Opinions differ. Written in red letters in French at the right above the sitter’s shoulder is: ‘To my friend Hippolyte / A reminder of our friendship.’ It is not known who Hippolyte was.
Mesdag greatly admired Courbet. This unconventional, nonchalant portrait is typical of the kind of paintings Mesdag bought. Its facture is spontaneous; the open shirt is suggested with long brushstrokes, and the face is energetically rendered with many short dabs in various colours.
- Object number
- hwm0078
- Dimensions
- 54.6 cm x 45.4 cm, 81.2 cm x 74.6 cm, 13.5 cm
- Provenance
- Acquired by Hendrik Willem Mesdag, The Hague, in or before 1888; Collection Museum Mesdag donated by Hendrik Willem Mesdag and Sientje Mesdag-van Houten to the State of the Netherlands, 14 May 1903; Rijksmuseum H.W. Mesdag, The Hague, from 1 August 1903; in trust of the Mauritshuis, The Hague, between 1934 and 1990; in trust of the Rijksmuseum Vincent van Gogh, Amsterdam, from 1 April 1990; Museum Mesdag, in trust of the Van Gogh Museum Foundation, Amsterdam, from 1 July 1994, under the name of De Mesdag Collectie from 2011.
- artist
- Gustave Courbet
- Credits
- The Mesdag Collection, The Hague
Passariano, Villa Manin di Passariano, L'età di Courbet e Monet, 26 September 2009-7 March 2010
Dijk, Maite van, Suijver, Renske, Fitski, M., Smits, C., De Mesdag Collectie, Amsterdam, 2011, p. 41, 51
Dijk, Maite van, Suijver, Renske, Fitski, M., Smits, C., The Mesdag Collection, Amsterdam, 2011, p. 41, 51
Vergeest, Aukje, The French collection : nineteenth-century French paintings in Dutch public collections, Amsterdam, 2000, p. 106-107
Bodt, Saskia de, Leeman, Fred, Leeuw, Ronald de, Pennock, Hanna, Museum Mesdag : catalogue of paintings and drawings, Zwolle, 1996, p. 67, 148