Self-portrait Anna Maria van Schurman in Rijksmuseum

David`van der Kellen, Ingrid Schenk and Pieta van Beek

Critical reply to Maria Holtrop, ‘Acquisitions: Fine and Applied Arts, and History, nr. 8’ in: The Rijksmuseum Bulletin (68), 2020, p. 82-83.

How much uncertainty about the topic of a painted self-portrait by Anna Maria van Schurman can one display in an article of less than two pages by referring to it as a work by an ‘Anonymous Artist’, followed by descriptions such as ‘most probably’, ‘possibly’, ‘probably’, ‘it is quite possible’, ‘it is assumed’, ‘it cannot be proved’, etc.? Of course the necessary caution is always valuable, especially in academic discourse, but it is clear that Maria Holtrop, general curator History of the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, cannot be regarded as an expert on Anna Maria van Schurman, and the same applies to the appraiser. Not a single scholarly article of their hand about Van Schurman is known to us. The short article under discussion is thus overflowing with factual errors, and the arguments used are flawed. If a peer review process has taken place at all. In order to categorise the work of art correctly, a thorough knowledge of the time, life and work of Van Schurman is essential.

Factual errors,?also in the Latin text:

Van Schurman was one of the few female ‘homines universalis’?

Comment: In Latin the plural should read: homines universales.

She knew thirteen languages and corresponded ?in four of them.

Comment: She knew at least fourteen languages and corresponded in at least seven of these: German, Dutch, French, Latin, Greek, Hebrew, Arabic and Italian.

At the age of fifteen she wrote a short letter in Latin to Jacob Cats,

Comment: She had been in contact with Jacob Cats at an even earlier age, at ca. 1620, when she was approximately 13 years of age (Van Beek 1992:49-53)

which led to her introduction to the distinguished Muider Circle

Comment: The Muider Circle was a loosely connected and ever-changing circle of literary friends meeting at the castle belonging to P.C. Hooft; Van Schurman only once was invited as a guest to one of their meetings.

and marked the start of a long exchange of correspondence which carried on until her death

Comment: Anna Maria van Schurman died in 1678, Jacob Cats in 1660. So the correspondence ended with his death, not hers.

Holtrop refers to the painted portrait as being a gouache.

Comment: Van der Stighelen (1987:72) categorises the object as an oil painting. This distinction between oil paintings and gouaches can also be found in the catalogue included in Van der Stighelen’s work (1987: 260-262). On what grounds or based on what differences does Holtrop identify the work of art as a gouache?

Van Schurman and self-portraits. Van Schurman made a number of self-portraits, especially in miniature format. In this way she could mirror herself, and as a woman, she was spared the nuisance of obtrusive male painters. If the self-portrait was not a success, that was not a serious problem, so she wrote in a Latin poem underneath her first attempt at engraving in 1633. On his request, she sent at least five small self-portraits to the English member of parliament Simonds d’Ewes (Van Beek 2010: 161-163).

Van Schurman and this self-portrait. The only book referred to by Maria Holtrop under the heading Literature is the standard volume on the artistic work by Anna Maria van Schurman by Katlijne van der Stighelen (1987). But even in reference to this work she thinks to know better. Van der Stighelen refers to the portrait as ‘met zekerheid een zelfportret’ [with certainty a self-portrait] (p.71) and a highlight among her self-portraits (p. 78). She includes an black-and-white illustration of the painting (p.72-73). Holtrop does not refer to any other sources which indicate that the painting under discussion is a self-portrait of Anna Maria van Schurman, such as Birch (1909: 96-97). In passing Holtrop mentions that the work was exhibited in 1910 at the Rotterdam exposition Portret miniaturen [Portrait miniatures]. She fails to mention that in the catalogue of this exhibition, the Catalogus der Tentoonstelling van Portretminiaturen (p. 49, nr. 232), the work was also identified as a self-portrait of Van Schurman.

It is commonly accepted practice to assign or reject portraits not signed in the handwriting of the artist, on grounds such as the presence or absence of similarities with other portraits of the same artist, albeit self-portraits or portraits by third parties. The provenance of the work is also examined. Both courses of action will be followed in this discussion.

In the first place this self-portrait by Van Schurman shows striking similarities in terms of facial features with the self-portrait dating from 1640, the copper plate of which forms part of the collection of the Museum Martena in Franeker, Friesland. This portrait,in diminished size, was also used in the first two editions of her work Opuscula Hebraea Graeca Latina et Gallica (1648 and 1650). The same applies to the large self-portrait of 1640 which is exhibited in Museum Martena and also to her portrait painted in 1649 by Jan Lievens which is now gracing the walls of the National Portrait Gallery in London. There is also a likeness between the various self-portraits in the first three ?editions of the Opuscula dating from 1648, 1650 and 1652 and the work under disctussion. Furthermore, the work also has an oval shape, the person portrayed looks diagonally to the right or left, as is the case in so many other self-portraits, just like wearing a pearl collar around her neck and her hair swept up in a (partial) bun. The similarities are too many to reject the miniature portrait as being a work of her hand.

The only argument used by Holtrop not to ascribe the portrait to Van Schurman is the following: It does not sit comfortably among the others she made; for instance, she had never used blue as a background before.

?

Comment: In the collection of Van Schurman’s art work in Museum Martena in Franeker there is a portrait of a youth where she has used a blue background.

?Museum Sypesteijn in the Dutch town of Nieuw-Loosdrecht also has in its collection a portrait of Jean de Labadie made by Van Schurman which features a light blue background. But even if no work of art by Van Schurman with a blue background had been known to us, one should still keep in mind the following considerations: a. she exhibited a clear yearning for variation and experiment, and b. she has made numerous works of art which have not survived until today.

?Re a: Variation and experiment. On a daily basis Van Schurman interspersed study time with making works of art of all kinds and with various materials: embroidery, paper-cutting, drawing, calligraphy, painting, wood-cutting, engraving, sculpting in wax, etc. This yearning for variation can be further illustrated by referring to the copper plate of the 1640 self-portrait which has survived. At the back of the copper engraving she has written some proverbs in Latin, French and Dutch which emphasise this love of variation. She was a skillful calligrapher able to produce various fonts, but the font used for the proverb Van minder tot meerder she has not used before. The three proverbs are the following:

Omnia conando docilis solertia vincit. [By testing everything the educational ingenuity conquers all.]

Personne ne sera bien son mestier s’il n’y primierement fait quelque peine. [Nobody would be good in his profession if he had not spent some effort beforehand.]

Van minder tot meerder. [From less to more.]

(See Van Beek 2016:13).

Re b. Reference to unknown works of art. Numerous texts in various languages for and by Van Schurman are overflowing with references to works of art not known to us today (see among others Van der Stighelen 265, 267-270, 274, 278; Van Beek, Het wereldwonder, 2023). For instance, by translating a Greek laudatory poem on Van Schurman written by the member of parliament and mayor Willem Staackmans I discovered that she had sent him a gift for the new year, consisting of a miniature depicting seven strawberries. He reciprocated by sending her seven little poems (six written in Latin and one in Greek). This work of art is not known to us today (Van Beek 2020).

?

PROVENANCE

At the time when the Van Der Kellen family offered a miniature self-portrait of Anna Maria van Schurman from their private collection to the Rijksmuseum, it was accepted with thanks. In the loan agreement dated 23 March 2018 the Rijksmuseum stated that the artist was Anna Maria van Schurman, and its title was Self-portrait Anna Maria van Schurman. It was examined under the microscope and briefly made an appearance in the documentary series Vrouw op Mars presented by Fidan Ekiz (Episode 1-2, dated 11 October 2018). It is of course possible that Holtrop has since found evidence that the portrait has not been painted by Van Schurman. However, none such evidence is presented; the only argument she advances (about the blue background) has already been refuted above.

Furthermore, Holtrop does not examine its provenance. The little portrait was the property of the Van der Kellen family, at least between 1910 and 2018, but who had owned it before them? Did the little portrait come into the hands of the brother of the great-grandfather David van der Kellen (Utrecht 02-01-1827 - NIeuwer-Amstel 09-09-1895) of David and Anna van der Kellen and via their father J.P. van der Kellen (1831-1906) to them? Or did it originate from the wife of their great-grandfather’s brother Johan Philp van der Kellen (Utrecht 09-07-1831 - Baarn 06-06-1906), Henriette Louise Koenen (1830-1881)? She was a fervent collector of drawings and graphic work made by women artists. No auction catalogues or articles about expositions have been consulted in this regard dating from the period before 1910. Last but not least, the backside of the portrait has not been examined under a microscope.

Therefore an urgent request is made to remove the white cardboard background in order to uncover any potential information hidden behind it. The wooden surrounding background above the white carton should also be examined to determine the age of the wood.

Is the text at the back of the work, as quoted by Birch (1909: 80-81) and copied by Van Der Stighelen and Holtrop in a somewhat modified form, correct? For instance, I am missing the heading of the inscription, Ao, 1652?

Birch: ANNA MARIA SCHUURMAN hanc suam effigiem ipsa pinxit

aetatis suae anno 44 1652 ?

? Van der Stighelen slightly modified the text presented by Birch: ?

Anna Maria Schurman hanc suam effigiem ipsa pinxit aetatis suae anno 44 1652

?Holtrop supplies the following: Anna Maria/ Schurman/ hanc suam effigiem/ ipsa pinxit/ aetatis suae/ anno 44/ 1652

?The back of the wooden panel was not researched

The back of the wooden panel Ao 1652 ??? Anna Maria Schurman hanc suam ?effigiem ipsa pinxit aetatis suae anno 44 1652 (?, this ?year?seems changed?)

?In the year 1652 Anna Maria van Schurman painted her own face herself at her age of 44 years 1652

Please, engage the services of a handwriting expert, examine the back of the object intensively under a microscope, determine the age of the wood used, etc. Holtrop advances that the portrait would have been made at least ten years earlier than the given date of 1652, but does not present any arguments to support this view.

The handwriting seems to contain elements of Gothic lettering, potentially indicating a provenance from Germany. Did Van Schurman make it for her cousin Anna Margaretha van Schurman who relocated to K?nigsberg (today Kaliningrad) after marrying the ?senior gamekeeper at the court, Sebastian Gross Pfersfelder? This cousin served as an information guide to the local poet and historian Rotger zum Bergen, who dedicated four laudatory writings to Van Schurman and also visited her in Utrecht (Van Beek 2015). But they were but a few of the many aquaintances, friends and relatives of Anna Maria van Schurman who might have received the portrait as a gift.

In summary, there is still a lot of research to be done on identifying and deciphering the handwriting, on the age of the wood parts, on the question of whether it might have been sold or bought at an auction, before it will be possible to determine with more certainty who was the receiver of this beautiful miniature self-portrait of Anna Maria van Schurman.

? David van der Kellen, Ingrid Schenk and Pieta van Beek.

?#Rijksmuseum #RijksmuseumBulletin #AnnaMariavanSchurman #AnneLarsen

Literature

G.D.J. Schotel, Anna Maria van Schurman. ’s-Hertogenbosch: Muller, 1853.

U. Birch, Anna Maria van Schurman, artist, scholar and saint. London: Longmans Green and Co, 1909.

Catalogus= Catalogus der tentoonstelling van portretminiaturen. Rotterdam: Rotterdamsche Kunstkring, ?1910.

Van der Stighelen 1987= Katlijne van der Stighelen, Anna Maria van Schurman (1607-1678) of ‘ Hoe hooge dat een maeght kan in de konsten stijgen.’ Leuven: 1987.

Van Beek 1992 = Pieta van Beek, ‘Verbastert Christendom’: Nederlandse gedichten van Anna Maria van Schurman (1607-1678). Houten: Den Hertog, 1992 (over Jacob Cats, p. 49-53).

Van Beek?2010 = Pieta van Beek, The first female university student: Anna Maria van Schurman (1636). Translated by D. Ehlers and A-M. Bonthuys. Utrecht: Igitur, 2010.

Van Beek 2015 = Pieta van Beek, Herrezen uit de as. Verbrande lofgeschriften van Rotger zum Bergen voor Anna Maria van Schurman (1649-1655). Ridderkerk: Provily Pers, 2015.

Van Beek 2016 = Pieta van Beek, Ex Libris, de bibliotheek van Anna Maria van Schurman en de catalogi van de Labadistenbibliotheek. Met medewerking van Joris Buerman. Ridderkerk: Provily Pers, 2016.

Van Beek 2020 = Pieta van Beek, ‘Ο?λτρα?εκτε?νων μ?γα κ?δο? π?τνια κο?ρη, the great glory and mighty maiden of Utrecht’: Greek eulogies in honour of Anna Maria van Schurman (1607–1678)’ in:?Meilicha D?ra. Poems and prose in Greek from Renaissance and early modern Europe. Commentationes Humanarum Litterarum vol. 138). Eds. Mika Kajava, Tua Korhonen and Jaimie Vesterinen. Helsinki: Societas Scientiarum Fennica, 2020.

Van Beek 2023= ‘Het wereldwonder van Utrecht’ Naam en faam van Anna Maria van Schurman, forthcoming.

For further information, see www.annamariavanschurman.org/publications