Isaac de Moucheron (1667-1744): His Life and Works with a Catalogue Raisonné of HisDrawings, Watercolors, Paintings and Etchings by Nina WeddeReview by: Paul Huys JanssenSimiolus: Netherlands Quarterly for the History of Art, Vol. 24, No. 4 (1996), pp. 361-363Published by: Stichting voor Nederlandse Kunsthistorische PublicatiesStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3780859 .

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BOOK REVIEWS 36I

Nina Wedde, Isaac de Moucheron (I667-I744): his life and works with a catalogue raisonne of his drawings, watercolors, paintings and etchings, 2 vols. (European University Studies vol. 236), Frankfurt am Main (Peter Lang) I996*

Although a second-rank painter now virtually unknown to the greater public, Isaac de Moucheron is still valued by a small cir- cle of admirers for his fine and well-executed landscapes. One of the best-selling artists in Amsterdam during his lifetime, his career was a classic instance of a painter who was guaranteed commercial success by his ability to respond to the fashions of the day. Capitalising on the boom in demand for rooms deco- rated with landscapes around the turn of the century, de Mou- cheron specialized in Italianate landscapes and park views; in- deed, in Amsterdam he held a virtual monopoly of the genre. This helps to explain the one-sidedness of his artistic legacy, for although de Moucheron was a craftsman who worked to high standards, and although the average quality of his work was also high, his oeuvre, whether drawn or painted, consists almost exclusively of idyllic landscapes.

To the present, little has been written on de Moucheron. In fact, there is altogether little on Dutch painting in the first dec- ades of the eighteenth century, and even less on the painted decorations of rooms. Such art is regarded as a poor offshoot of the higher and more invigorating art of the Golden Age. And it is also the case that de Moucheron's work, which was strongly influenced by late seventeenth-century Roman land- scape art, particularly that of Gaspard Dughet and Salvator Rosa, is not regarded as typically Dutch. Indeed, Dutch artists who affiliated themselves with this international landscape school are not always seen as unalloyed Dutchmen.' De Mou- cheron's place within Dutch art history seems safe nonetheless: it was, after all, in Holland that he made his career.

Undisturbed by the conventional prejudices against artists such as de Moucheron, the Finnish art historian Nina Wedde has devoted a two-volume monograph to his work. There are few who would dare to venture into regions so disregarded and therefore so uncharted, and her comprehensive treatment of this minor master deserves great praise. Wedde herself attri- butes her choice of subject to the advice of Marcel Roethlisber- ger, her tutor at the University of Geneva.

The first volume deals with the life of Isaac de Moucheron, the third generation in a line of painters. Of French origin, the family had emigrated to Amsterdam in the sixteenth century, where they headed a firm of merchants. The first painter in the family, Balthasar de Moucheron (born ca. 1587), was fol- lowed by his son Frederick (I633-86). Five daughters were

born of Frederick's marriage to Maria de Jouderville, the daughter of Rembrandt's pupil, Isaac de Jouderville. They were followed by Isaac, who was named after his maternal grandfather. There are also references to his younger brother Balthasar, who was christened in i674 and described as a "fijnschilder", but of whom nothing more is known.

Isaac was trained by his father, a successful painter of Ita- lianate landscapes who had spent a long period working in France before settling permanently in Amsterdam in I659. Frederick died in i686 when in his early 5os, and this meant that Isaac was only I8 when he inherited his father's studio and estate. By that time he had already mastered his father's style to the extent that he was able satisfactorily to complete those commissions that had remained unfinished. Frederick's success and reputation definitely made such a continuation profitable, and no doubt explains why some of the work per- formed in his name was probably executed by Isaac. Wedde cites a number of examples. The situation is reminiscent of the story of Jan and Julius Porcellis, in which, upon his father's sudden death, the son continued a successful business as a painter of marines.'

Wedde states that, by continuing and completing Frede- rick's work, Isaac was able to finance a journey to Italy. This was in fact a normal undertaking, and in his case was almost mandatory, as any painter of Italianate landscapes was required to study the source material at first hand. Isaac was 27 when he left Amsterdam. In I695 he was in Bologna, and in I697 in Rome, where he became a member of the Bentvueghels, acquir- ing the nickname "Ordonnantie." In August of the same year, however, he was already back in Amsterdam. He retumed with a large stock of drawings that was to provide him with material for the rest of his life.

At this point Wedde interrupts the biographical section of her book in order to digress briefly on art in the time of de Mou- cheron and his patrons. By the end of the seventeenth century, the French fashions for garden art and decorative painting were flourishing in Holland. Most wealthy Dutch citizens had the walls and ceilings of their town and country houses decorated. Ceilings usually featured cloudy skies with putti, or mythologi- cal scenes such as the highly successful ones executed by Jacob de Wit (I696- I750). Walls were decorated with the kind of Ita- lianate landscapes or park views described and recommended by Gerard de Lairesse in his Groot Schilderboek (1707). Jo- hannes Glauber (I646-1726) and Albert Meyeringh (I645- I714) were the first to enjoy considerable success with scenes of this type. Isaac de Moucheron and his slightly younger con- temporary Jan van Huysum (I682-1749) joined their ranks.

* This review was translated from the Dutch by David Alexander. i Cf. A. Blankert, exhib. cat. Nederlandse I7e eeuwse italianiserende land-

schapschilders, Utrecht (Centraal Museum) I965, pp. 29-30.

2 J. Walsh Jr, "The Dutch marine painters Jan and Julius Porcellis II: Jan's maturity and dejonge Porcellis," The Burlington Magazine I I 6 (1974), pp. 734- 45.

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362 BOOK REVIEWS

Plainly, a great number of the rooms thus decorated (called "zaelen" in contemporary accounts) no longer exist. Wedde therefore performs a valuable service by adding to her catalogue a list of all the documented cases in which Dutch houses had this kind of decoration.

Although Isaac de Moucheron had been trained as a land- scape painter, he was also capable of painting the figures in his landscapes. However, for help with staffage he sometimes called in others, such as Nicolaes Verkolje and Jan van Logte- ren. He also drew on the examples contained in the portfolio of drawings he had made in Italy, such as those of the Laocoon and the Farnese Hercules. One of de Moucheron's earliest commissions featuring such Italianate staffage was probably the decoration painted for the wealthy merchant Abraham Bue- no de Mezquita, either at the latter's Amsterdam town house at Herengracht 390, or at his country house, Vechttevoort. Although only incomplete copies of this work remain, its ap- pearance is known from preliminary studies and from later prints issued in small editions. With its antique buildings and statuary, this series of Italian harbor and park scenes was at, or near, the source of a large and increasing flood of commissions. Johan van Gool, one of de Moucheron's most important bio- graphers, names various other rooms decorated by the artist. These were mainly in Amsterdam and in nearby country seats, although mention is also made of one in Utrecht.3 Many of these clients are identified by name, and it would have been use- ful if Wedde had devoted to these upper-class patrons the at- tention promised in her introduction. Unfortunately, however, she restricts herself to what is already known from the litera- ture-indulging, what is more, in much unnecessary repeti- tion.

On occasion Wedde's diffused treatment of her material means that our view of de Moucheron's activities is severely disrupted. More than once, she examines in considerable detail the project undertaken for Bueno de Mezquita-not only in the chapter on patrons (pp. i io-I i), but also in the drawings cata- logue (pp. 301-15), in the separate catalogue of the decorative paintings (pp. 489-go), and once more in her examination of the prints made after these paintings (pp. 5o6- io). The infor- mation concerning the remaining in situ decorations painted by de Moucheron, Jacob de Wit and Jan van Logteren for the house of Maria Luyken at Herengracht I68 in Amsterdam in approximately 1728-30 becomes similarly disjointed. As the project is pursued variously on pp. I13-I6, 38I -84 and 476- 8o, it becomes difficult to follow in any coherent fashion. It is also regrettable that the index is not always reliable, and that the relevant pages cannot always be found via their headwords. It

would certainly have been clearer if de Moucheron's oeuvre had been approached chronologically, project by project.

After the digression into the artistic context of de Moucheron and his patrons, the author returns to the biography. In I713, at the late age of 45 (and in a union that was to prove childless), Isaac married Anna van der Bucken, i i years his junior. By then his many commissions had made him a wealthy man. In 1725 he was able to buy a fine house on Amsterdam's Prinsen- gracht, where he lived and worked for the rest of his life. It was also in this house that he established his impressive art collec- tion.

He died on 20 July I744. On I December and the following days his estate was auctioned. This included hundreds of paint- ings and drawings (over 498 of them his own), as well as minia- tures, albums with prints and drawings, books and statues. Each of these was described in the catalogue printed for the oc- casion, only two copies of which are now thought to remain, in Antwerp and Paris.4 In 1752 Gerard Hoet published an extract consisting of 5I items.5 For the formation of a complete view of de Moucheron's collection it would have been sensible if Wedde had provided the integral version of the auction catalo- gue; however, for reasons of economy, only a concise version is supplied (in Appendix 2.b).

The second part of Wedde's book is devoted to de Moucheron's artistry. It was particularly in his drawings and watercolors that this achieved an identity of its own, and Wedde is correct to treat these before the paintings. Although he also executed the occasional Norwegian landscape, de Moucheron specialized in Italianate landscapes and parks. Few of his drawings are either signed or dated. In establishing his oeuvre, Wedde bases herself on the ideas An Zwollo formulated in her dissertation.6 An- other important point of departure was also described by Zwol- lo, namely the collection of photographs at the Netherlands In- stitute for Art History (R K D) in The Hague. The drawings are classified in two categories, which Wedde terms exploratory drawings and pictorial drawings. While the first served as pre- liminary studies, the second should be regarded as autonomous works of art. The copies de Moucheron made after his own de- signs constitute a link between the two categories; in the catalo- gue these have been given their own numbers. However, although the artist also made extensive use of sketchbooks, none of these survive. They were dismantled and the individual drawings were sold separately.

In this connection Wedde considers the collectors of de Moucheron's work, some of whom were already active during

3 J. van Gool, De nieuwe schouburg der Nederlantsche kunstschilders en schil- deressen, 2 vols. The Hague 1750-51, vol. I, pp. 362-67.

4 See F. Lugt, Rlpertoire des catalogues de ventes publiques intlressant lart ou la curiositl, The Hague 1938, nr. 60g. The catalogue is not included in the mi- crofilm edition of Artsales catalogues I600-I825 to date.

5 G. Hoet, Catalogus of naamlyst van schilderyen, met derzelver pryzen, 2 vols., The Hague I752, vol. 2, pp. 154-55.

6 A. Zwollo, Hollandse en Vlaamse veduteschilders te Rome (I675-1725), As- sen 1973.

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BOOK REVIEWS 363

his lifetime. Catalogues dating from I736 and 1739 show that significant numbers of his drawings were present in at least two prominent collections, those of Samuel van Huls and Valerius Rover. Van Huls possessed no fewer than 56 drawings by de Moucheron. Pieter Teyler van der Hulst (1702-78) also bought a great deal of his work, and this is still to be seen in the eponymous Teylers Museum in Haarlem. In general terms, the artist's work was much in demand throughout the eighteenth century. This is plain from the list of auctions featuring de Moucherons, which Wedde includes as an appendix.

In her discussion of the paintings Wedde makes a distinction between the easel paintings and the decorative works. Only a limited number of the former still exist-in the catalogue there are 59. The fact that they are often hard to distinguish from those by Frederick de Moucheron suggests that they are prob- ably early works. Wedde's statement that these were not an im- portant source of income for Isaac might seem to contradict her assertion that they financed his journey to Italy. However, it is quite possible that the sale of such paintings was of initial im- portance to the young painter, and that the success he enjoyed with his decorative commissions after his return from Italy meant that he subsequently spent less time at the easel.

In a chapter that is somewhat over-long, Wedde surveys the history of landscapes as a wall decoration, beginning with the Greeks and Romans and ending with the painted wallpapers of the nineteenth century. She also focuses on the Dutch con- tribution to the genre, and more particularly on the position occupied within it by Isaac de Moucheron, whose documented commissions are then discussed individually.

De Moucheron's art can hardly be said to have evolved over the years. He clung to the Italianate style he had learned from his father, combining it with the impressions gained in Italy, especially from Gaspard Dughet. At the very most it might be possible to speak of a slight shift from the painting of Italian landscapes towards park views painted in an Italianate style.

The three pages on de Moucheron's engravings are nothing more than an introduction to the prints included in the catalo- gue, a section of the book they should therefore have preceded.

Before moving on to the catalogue, it might be useful to com- ment on the information Wedde has included in the third, fourth and fifth parts of her book. In respective order, these contain appendices, an extensive bibliography and a commen- tary on the known and documented portraits of de Moucheron. It is a particular shortcoming of the list of documents contained

in the first appendix that it embodies a diversity of information relevant to but not incorporated in the biographical chapter, such as precise data on christenings, marriages and deaths. This is followed by a transcription of de Moucheron's will, the sum- mary of the catalogue of the auction of his estate, and by a list of the auctions at which his work was represented. The third part closes with miscellaneous material on de Moucheron written by a variety of chroniclers and art historians from I 704 to 1970- material that many might wish had been more comprehensive.

The sixth part of Wedde's dissertation contains the catalogue, which takes up more than half the total book. It is well laid-out, beginning with the drawings (222 items) and followed by the watercolors (I83), paintings (59) and the decorative paintings, which are unnumbered. The catalogue closes with 53 prints made by or after de Moucheron. A number of sub-categories have been devised that make it easier to search within an oeuvre that is somewhat lacking in variation: these include topography (identified and unidentified views), woodlands and hunt scenes, Italianate works (including classical scenes, harbors and designs for rooms), gardens and park landscapes. It is un- clear, however, precisely which criteria were applied in the creation of these groups. Unverifiable attributions and rejected works are listed under separate numbers within each category.

The provenance, the literature and the short descriptions of each work are both informative and useful; in this respect, the catalogue gives the impression of being thorough and compre- hensive. Unfortunately, though, the catalogue fails to indicate which works are shown in the volume of plates. This is pro- foundly irritating, as only a little over half the oeuvre-273 out of approximately 500 works-is reproduced. It also detracts greatly from the practical help a catalogue should provide.

The inadequacies of the index are another shortcoming, par- ticularly the absence of information on little-known works in private collections or on the market. Tracing such work through the index is frequently difficult and sometimes alto- gether impossible a nuisance not only to readers, art histor- ians and collectors, but also to art dealers and auction houses. This comprehensive study of the life and work of Isaac de Mou- cheron would have gained much from stricter editing and more painstaking production.

PAUL HUYS JANSSEN

NOORDBRABANTS MUSEUM

'S-HERTOGENBOSCH

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