Adriaen Coorte

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Adriaen Coorte: Still Life with a Bundle of Asparagus , 1697, Rijksmuseum Amsterdam

Adriaen Coorte (* around 1665 , † after 1707 ), also Adrian Coorte or Adriaen Corte , was a Dutch Baroque painter . Little is known about the life of the artist who specializes in still lifes . Coorte was almost forgotten for almost 200 years after his death. His work only found its way into public collections in the 20th century.

It is assumed that Coortes was training at Melchior de Hondecoeter in Amsterdam. He then worked as a painter between 1685 and 1707 in the Middelburg area . In his early work there are depictions of birds and some vanitas paintings . In the later pictures Coorte preferred berries, asparagus or mussels for his still lifes. In doing so, he mostly limited himself to a few objects that are characterized by a particularly natural representation. Two thirds of his works were initially created on paper and later transferred to wood or canvas, a technique that was rarely used during the artist's lifetime.

Life

Mountain landscape with ducks , 1683, private collection

Almost nothing is known about Adriaen Coorte's life. There is no information on the place and date of his birth or information about the time and place of his death. There is also no evidence of his family background. The first known documentary mention of Coortes is in the books of the Guild of Luke in the Dutch city of Middelburg for the year 1695 or 1696. Thereafter, the Guild of Painters fined Coorte for illegally attempting to sell paintings without being a member of the guild.

Coorte was almost forgotten for almost 200 years after his death and only a few private collectors knew his pictures. His name only appeared sporadically in sales documents during this time. Coorte was first mentioned in art history literature in 1881 by the French Henry Havard, followed in 1889 by the Dutch architect Jan Adriaan Frederiks. Both had works by Coorte in their collections and described his work in articles. In 1903, Arnoldus des Tombe from The Hague donated Coortes Still Life with asparagus from 1697 to the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam , which gave a wider public the opportunity to view one of his works. The art historian and then director of the Dordrechts Museum , Laurens J. Bol, published a detailed article about the painter for the first time in 1952. After a retrospective dedicated to the artist in 1958 in the Dordrechts Museum, at which 35 works by Coorte were shown, Bol finally published a monograph on Adriaen Coorte in 1977, which included a catalog raisonné of the famous paintings. On the occasion of a retrospective of Coortes works in 2008 in the Mauritshuis in The Hague, an updated and annotated catalog raisonné by Quentin Buvelot was published.

There are various assumptions about the year of Coorte's birth. Based on the assumed apprenticeship in Amsterdam from 1680 to 1683, the art historian Quentin Buvelot assumes a possible year of birth in the period 1660–1665. Fred G. Meijer from the Rijksbureau voor Kunsthistorische Documentatie gives the year of birth “(around) 1665”. Art historians also come to different considerations when it comes to the origin of the painter. A document from 1780 states Vlissingen as Coortes' place of origin . Further south, in the Spanish Netherlands , the art historian Arthur K. Wheelock sees the area of ​​origin of Adriaen Coorte. According to the records of the art historian Abraham Bredius , the name Adriaen Coorte was mentioned in Middelburg in 1665. According to Bredius, this could also have been the artist's father. There is also a Johan Coorte 1659 as a member of the community of Sluis .

In addition to the note in the books of the Guild of St. Luke, the fact that his paintings in the 18th and 19th centuries were almost exclusively recorded in inventories and auction documents in the province of Zeeland speaks for Coortes work as a painter in the Middelburg area . It is assumed that Coortes trained as a painter at Melchior de Hondecoeter in Amsterdam from 1680 to 1683. Coorte's earliest known work, Mountain Landscape with Ducks from 1683, is partially copied from paintings by de Hondecoeter. His dated works go back to the year 1707. Since the artist's well-known oeuvre only comprises a little more than 100 works, it is unclear whether Coorte was able to earn his living from painting alone, or whether he had another profession. The earliest evidence that a work by Coorte was auctioned is from August 3, 1713. Quentin Buvelot believes it is possible that Adriaen Coorte was still alive at that time, as the painter's death is not recorded in the auction documents.

plant

Painting style

Still life with three medlar fruits and a butterfly , around 1696–1700, private collection

For the majority of his pictures, Coorte limited himself to depicting a few objects. His paintings are characterized by a detailed fine painting with clever lighting. The objects appear almost realistic thanks to a particularly natural representation. Occasionally, however, there are weaknesses in perspective. This is particularly evident in some of the stone tables and clay vessels shown.

Coorte painted about two thirds of his still lifes on paper. During the painting process or immediately after completion, he fixed the paper on wood or canvas. Although it is now assumed that Coorte carried out this work himself, there are some indications that the transfer onto canvas or wood may not have taken place until the 18th or 19th century, especially since this so-called Marouflé technique in the 17th and 18th centuries was rarely used. During the restoration of the painting Two Peaches with a Butterfly from 1693–1695, an old invoice came to light on the back of the paper after the paper was separated from the carrier. Coorte may have used waste paper as a base for other paintings as well. During the restoration of three other pictures in 2007, small holes were discovered in the paper, which suggest that the paper was fixed during the painting process.

Motifs

Vanitas Still Life , 1686, private collection

Coortes well-known oeuvre is relatively small with just over 60 signed works. Together with some pictures that are only known from older descriptions, Bol's catalog of works from 1977 included a total of 109 works by the artist. Most of the pictures are dated and date from 1683 to 1707, the majority of which were made between 1696 and 1705. All of these pictures show still lifes, almost without exception with fruits, vegetables, mussels or some vanitas still lifes against a dark background.

The exceptions include three early works with poultry motifs in a landscape. In addition to the painting A Hen with Chicks attributed to Coorte and dated 1682/1683, this group includes the works Mountain Landscape with Ducks and Pelican and Ducks in a Mountain Landscape , signed by the artist with the year 1683 , which Melchior de Hondecoeter took over in parts Have motifs. The pelican and three ducks from de Hondecoeter's painting The Floating Feather (Rijksmuseum Amsterdam), for example, can be found almost unchanged in Coorte's painting Pelican and Ducks in a Mountain Landscape . In 1699 Coorte again resorted to the landscape motif as a background, again using a motif by de Hondecoeter as a model. In the still life with a bunch of asparagus, a sprig of gooseberries, a bowl of strawberries and a hoopoe in the background , the hoopoe is a copy from de Hondecoeter's birds in a park from 1686 (Rijksmuseum Amsterdam).

The artist's early work also includes three well-known vanitas still lifes, which were created between 1686 and 1688. The subject of transience - typical of Dutch baroque still lifes - was the theme of Coorte in these pictures by adding symbolic objects. The Vanitas still life (private collection) dated 1686 contains a skull and an hourglass , for example . In addition, an oil lamp indicates the elapsing time. In the Vanitas still life of 1687, next to a skull, there is a candle that indicates the finiteness of life. The vanitas still life in a niche from 1688 again shows a skull and an oil lamp. Here the painter also added a pocket watch as a symbol of time running out. Other props such as a pipe or a dance master's violin represent the fleeting nature of the smoke or the rapidly fading music, both of which are also references to the passage of time.

Coortes still lifes are often arranged on a corner of a base or a stone slab, sometimes in a niche. Such stone slabs - including window ledges - were already used by Dutch artists such as Pieter Claesz or Karel Slabbaert as a base for their still life objects before Coorte . The stone at Coorte is often provided with a notch or a crack, which underlines the transience of the still life motifs. He also preferred to use the edge of the stone to place his signature, which sometimes appears as A. Coorte , sometimes only with AC .

Still life with strawberries , 1705, Mauritshuis, The Hague

In contrast to the complex flower and fruit compositions of his contemporary painter colleagues, such as Ambrosius Bosschaert and Balthasar van der Ast , who worked in Middelburg , Coorte chose a reduction to a few objects in his pictures and shows a motivic relationship to the works of Spanish painters such as Juan Sánchez Cotán or Francisco de Zurbarán . His still lifes, which are arranged as simply as possible, often lack any decorative accessories. Coortes' smallest executed work, for example, shows the postcard-sized still life with two walnuts , the two nuts roughly in their original size and otherwise only the stone slab as a background.

The repetition of certain motifs is striking. In addition to a few artichokes, only asparagus can be found in his work. In no less than 13 images, it always appears in a bundle. Coorte reproduces strawberries even more frequently in his pictures, a motif that he may have previously seen in pictures by Jan Jansz van de Velde (* 1620). He shows most of the depictions of strawberries in Coortes pictures in a bowl made of clay, in three motifs clearly of Chinese origin. These bowls are overly filled and often provided with a flower stem from a strawberry plant. Expensive porcelain or silver vessels are missing from the Coortes factory, as are precious glasses. This becomes all the more clear in the comparison of Coortes pictures to possible models of his subjects . A bunch of asparagus and a bowl of strawberries can also be found in a painting by Isaac van Duynen , who, however, added a precious glass goblet to these fruits ( Michaelis Collection , Cape Town). There is also great similarity between the breakfast still life by Pieter Claesz from 1636 (Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam) and the breakfast still life by Coorte from 1697. In both pictures, next to a bread roll, there is a fish cut into small pieces on a plate and a glass vessel to see. While Coortes glass is very simple and hardly emerges from the semi-darkness, Claesz glass has elaborate decorations and is in direct light. The difference between the two plates is even more striking: Coorte chose a simple wooden plate, whereas Claesz's fish is on a silver plate. Claesz also draped his still life on a table with a white blanket instead of a simple stone slab.

Still life with shells , 1697, private collection

Other fruits in Coortes pictures are grapes, gooseberries, cherries, peaches, apricots, currants, oranges and medlars . In contrast, apples and pears are missing in his paintings. In addition to the walnut motif, Coorte also painted pictures with hazelnuts or chestnuts. Occasionally a butterfly appears in the fruit still lifes, in one picture he added a dragonfly. These insects may have an allegorical meaning and could represent rebirth, immortality, or resurrection. Seven paintings by Coortes are reserved for the shell motif. A shiny moon snail ( Euspira nitida ) can only be seen in one of these pictures , as can also be found in its home country Zeeland on the North Sea. All other mussels are imports, as they came to the Netherlands with the Dutch East India Company or the Dutch West India Company and found their way into chambers of curiosities and other collections there for high prices . Balthasar van der Ast painted these treasures before Coorte around 1630 and in Rembrandt's work there are also etchings with such shell motifs. During Coorte's lifetime, however, a series of 38 etchings by the copperplate engraver Wenzel Hollar was especially well known, showing shells in great detail against a plain white background.

reception

After the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam was the first museum to have a painting by Coorte in its collection in 1903, it took almost 80 years for writers to grapple with the painter's work. Two Dutch authors showed themselves to be admirers of Coorte's work in 1981. For example, Hans Faverey dedicates a poem in Lichtval Adriaen Coorte and deals with paintings with shell or strawberry motifs, and finally his still life thoughts with the line "de toekomst bleef even onveranderlijk als nu." (Analogously, the future remains as unchangeable as the now ) to rewrite. Ed Leeflang names Coorte in his volume of poems Bewoond as ik ben “De schilder van asperges en frambozen” (The painter of asparagus and raspberries) , although Coorte 's pictures are not raspberries but strawberry varieties from the 17th century.

Works in public collections

literature

Web links

Commons : Adriaen Coorte  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Quentin Buvelot: The still lifes of Adriaen Coorte. P. 16.
  2. ↑ Quentin Buvelot: The still lifes of Adriaen Coorte. P. 23.
  3. ↑ a b c Fred G. Meijer: Coorte, Adriaen in Allgemeines Künstlerlexikon, 1999, Volume XXI, p. 93.
  4. ↑ a b c d e Quentin Buvelot: The still lifes of Adriaen Coorte. P. 15.
  5. ↑ a b c d Quentin Buvelot: The still lifes of Adriaen Coorte. P. 57.
  6. ↑ a b c d e f Quentin Buvelot: The still lifes of Adriaen Coorte. P. 18.
  7. ↑ During the bombing of Middelburg in 1940, a large part of the city's archives were lost, including the archives of the Guild of St. Luke. Today only a few copies of these sources exist. In Quentin Buvelot: The still lifes of Adriaen Coorte. P. 18.
  8. ↑ a b c Quentin Buvelot: The still lifes of Adriaen Coorte. P. 17.
  9. ↑ In a description of a still life attributed to Coorte, Vlissingen was given as the painter's origin in 1780. The painting called BloemStuck door Coorte te Vlissingen (Flower Piece by Coorte from Vlissingen) is mentioned in the inventory of Jacob van Citters, formerly Archives von des Tombes, today National Archives Utrecht. In Quentin Buvelot: The still lifes of Adriaen Coorte. P. 121.
  10. ^ Arthur K. Wheelock: The Golden Age of Dutch and Flemish painting. P. 48.
  11. ^ Laurens Johannes Bol: Adriaen Coorte. P. 3.
  12. ^ A b Quentin Buvelot: The still lifes of Adriaen Coorte. P. 75.
  13. ↑ Coorte's paintings that have survived to this day are dated to 1705. When the HWF van Panhus collection was sold in Amsterdam in 1882, the art historian Abraham Bredius made notes about a work by Coortes dated and signed 1707, whose whereabouts and motifs are unclear today. In Quentin Buvelot: The still lifes of Adriaen Coorte. Pp. 18 and 124.
  14. ↑ It is a work called Vrugten, door van Koorde (fruits, by van Koorde) , which is listed at the auction of the collection of the Mayor of Middelburg, Jean Walran Sandra. In Quentin Buvelot: The still lifes of Adriaen Coorte. Pp. 75 and 120.
  15. ↑ Quentin Buvelot: The still lifes of Adriaen Coorte. P. 127.
  16. ^ A b Quentin Buvelot: The still lifes of Adriaen Coorte. P. 24.
  17. ↑ a b c Quentin Buvelot: The still lifes of Adriaen Coorte. P. 30.
  18. ↑ Quentin Buvelot: The still lifes of Adriaen Coorte. P. 28.
  19. ↑ a b c Quentin Buvelot: The still lifes of Adriaen Coorte. P. 29.
  20. ↑ Quentin Buvelot: The still lifes of Adriaen Coorte. P. 27.
  21. ↑ Quentin Buvelot: The still lifes of Adriaen Coorte. P. 42.
  22. ↑ a b c Quentin Buvelot: The still lifes of Adriaen Coorte. P. 54.
  23. ↑ Quentin Buvelot: The still lifes of Adriaen Coorte. P. 50.
  24. ↑ Quentin Buvelot: The still lifes of Adriaen Coorte. P. 74.
  25. ^ Anton Korteweg: Een engel zending achter een pilaar: Poems over schilderijen . Pages 178-181.
This version was added to the list of articles worth reading on April 13, 2010 .
personal data
SURNAME Coorte, Adriaen
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Corte, Adriaen; Coorte, Adrian
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Dutch painter
DATE OF BIRTH around 1665
DATE OF DEATH after 1707