Posted on 03/13/2023 12:04:45 PM PDT by Red Badger
Researchers with the Nivaagaard Collection in Denmark have pieced together two parts of portrait of a family painted by the Flemish master Cornelis de Vos in 1626, believed to have been skillfully separated at some point between 1830 and 1859 after sustaining damage. Photo courtesy of Nivaagaard Collection March 11 (UPI) -- A mother has been reunited with her son and husband nearly 200 years after they were separated from each other.
Researchers with the Nivaagaard Collection in Denmark have pieced together two parts of portrait of a family painted by the Flemish master Cornelis de Vos in 1626, believed to have been skillfully separated at some point between 1830 and 1859 after sustaining damage, the museum said in a statement.
The team was first clued in when eagle-eyed observers spotted that part of a dress can be seen in the bottom right corner of the painting Double Portrait of a Father and Son, which the researchers said indicated "that the mother had been cropped away."
It was not immediately clear when and how Double Portrait received its name, but the title indicates that it was named after the painter's death and its subsequent separation.
The researchers began their hunt for the missing mother last year and uncovered a 1966 report from the National Museum of Art in Copenhagen, which included a photograph of the painting after it had been cleaned and restored.
That photograph showed the "elaborate" details of the missing woman's arm, seemingly not noticeable in the portrait's current state, which researchers said "cast fresh light on how grand and elegant" the original portrait must have been
.Jørgen Wadum, a special consultant with the Nivaagaard Collection who participated in the investigative efforts, said the team began its search by looking for matches among other women depicted in paintings by de Vos.
Wadum said luck struck when he decided to try a simple search on Google using the search term "portrait of a lady."
"It was totally unexpected!" Wadum said in a statement.
The team discovered that a work, serendipitously titled Portrait of a Lady, was auctioned at Christie's in London in 2014, which showed a woman wearing a large millstone collar like that of the father in Double Portrait.
The new owner, Salomon Lilian, a leading art dealer based in Amsterdam and Geneva, had the portrait cleaned and restored soon after its acquisition," the Nivaagaard Collection statement reads.
Restoring Portrait of a Lady included a process of removing the painting's background, which revealed that a coat of paint had been added to cover up the original backdrop.
"Behind the elegant lady, a distant landscape now began to emerge on the left side of the portrait, as well as a blue sky with white horizontal clouds overhead," the news release reads.
The new landscape appeared to match the background of Double Portrait.
Wadum said that the team also had good fortune that Lilian had decided to have the work restored, and that a picture of it had been included in a 2016 interview with CODART eZine.
The height of the painting of the mother is less than half that of the painting of Double Portrait, which was already in the Nivaagaard Collection, further suggesting that the two portraits were once one.
The Nivaagaard Collection has since obtained a grant to purchase Portrait of a Lady and reunite the family.
PinGGG!.........................
Whoever owned the left side of the piece with father and son must have known a figure was missing due to that adult sized female hand left dangling on the lower right edge of the composition. Yes, they had lots of geld, but those expensive clothes sure do look uncomfortable.
That’s an Elizabethan collar before the era of Queen Elizabeth.
painted by the Flemish master Cornelis de Vos in 1626..........
Elizabeth I
Queen of England and Ireland from 1558 to 1603
Fascinating story and picture(s)!
Those collars remind me of some auto air filters I used to have to change.
Then again, maybe she did inspire those big and lacy collars.
I might be thinking of a later Queen Elizabeth.
At the end of Queen Elizabeth 1st reign, the ‘ruff’ collar was beginning to fall out of fashion in the UK and eventually eastward into Europe, although some places it held on for another 50 or so years................
From the article:
That photograph showed the "elaborate" details of the missing woman's arm, seemingly not noticeable in the portrait's current state, which researchers said "cast fresh light on how grand and elegant" the original portrait must have been...
Apparently the part of the portrait with the arm had sustained some damage, but was only revealed by an archived photo.
They were elegant, but if I had to wear one, the way I eat, it would be a mess…
It is pretty cool that the two pieces were brought together. It’s a neat story.
Thanks Red Badger.
Why would one wear a dog cone? Even back in the day.
So someone cut momma outta the picture. What she do?
Ah yes, the Flemish Masers. From Flemland of course.
For the same reason men wore an onion on their belts, because it was the style back then..................
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
