Lot 48. Dirck Jacobsz. (Amsterdam? C.1497-1567), Portrait of Pieter Jansz. Gaef, alias Spiegel (1505⁄6-1581), half-length, holding a skull, dated and inscribed '1558 / WIE · DAT - GHIJ · SET / GHEDINCKT - TE · STERVE / WILT - IN · V · TIJT / GODS · RIJCK · VERWERVE / ETATIS 52' (upper left, on the white paper), with the sitter's coat of arms (upper right), oil on panel, 70.6 x 55.2 cm. Price realised USD 352,800 (Estimate USD 250,000 – USD 350,000). © Christies 2024

Provenance: Commissioned by the sitter Pieter Jansz. Gaef in 1558, Amsterdam, and by descent to the present owner.

Note: The Amsterdam painter Dirck Jacobsz. was born at the end of the fifteenth century, the second son of the painter Jacob Cornelisz. van Oostsanen (c. 1460⁄65-1533). Though the precise place and date of his birth are unknown, the latter can be approximated based on Karel van Mander’s claim that the artist was around 70 years old at the time of his death. At a very young age Dirck was already living in Amsterdam, where in 1500 his father bought a large workshop on Kalverstraat. Dirck trained with his father alongside his brother, Cornelis Jacobsz. (c. 1490-1532) and several other artists, including his close friend, Jan van Scorel (1495-1562). In 1548, Dirck himself purchased a house in Amsterdam called De Drie Coppen (The Three Heads), located on the affluent Warmoesstraat. It is likely a few years later that he married the cloth merchant Marritgen Gerrits (?-1570), known as 'silver Marritgen', with whom he had two children, including the painter Jacob Dirksz. (?-1568). Dirck’s father was extremely versatile, producing large painted altarpieces, smaller panels for private devotion, portraits and ceiling paintings in churches. In contrast, Dirck appears to have specialized primarily in portraiture – particularly group portraits of members of civic guard companies - and was one of the first northern Netherlandish painters to do so.

Besides the present portrait, only a handful of other paintings can be attributed to Dirck Jacobsz. with certainty, and nearly all are now in museum collections. His earliest painting is also recognized as the first group militia portrait in Dutch art, the 1529 Triptych with Guardsmen of the Amsterdam Kloveniersdoelen (Headquarters of the Arquebusiers’ Civic Guard), in the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam (on loan from the City of Amsterdam; fig. 1), which established a genre that would flourish over the course of the next century. In addition to his militia company group portraits, Dirck also excelled in the portrayal of the Amsterdam well-to-do bourgeoisie, of which the present individual portrait is an excellent example. He was especially celebrated for his capacity to capture expressions, particularly through his distinctive portrayal of hands. Indeed, van Mander describes in his Schilderboeck (1604) how a collector named Jacob Rauvert became so enamored by a hand in one of Dirck’s portraits that he attempted to convince the artist to cut it out of the painting and sell it to him for a sizable amount (cited in M.J. Friedländer, Early Netherlandish Painting, New York and Washington, 1975, XIII, p. 70).

Fig. 1. Dirck Jacobsz, Triptych with Guardsmen of the Amsterdam Kloveniersdoelen (Headquarters of the Arquebusiers’ Civic Guard) 1529, 1529 and circa 1552, oil on oak wood, 122 x 340 cm, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam (on loan from the City of Amsterdam).

In the present painting, the merchant Pieter Jansz. Gaef, alias Spiegel sits behind a stone table, directing his gaze at the viewer. He wears a dark doublet beneath a brown and white fur-lined overgown together with a flat beret with earflaps. In 1558, the year Dirck Jacobsz. captured his likeness, the sitter was 52 years old and living in De Gulden Spiegel, a house on the Warmoesstraat in Amsterdam (the same street where Dirck himself lived). He may be recognized by the family coat of arms at right, which Olivier Mertens, to whom we are grateful, has identified as: per pale, Argent (silver), two wings addorsed Sable (black) and Azure (blue), a tower Gules (red), in chief a small octagonal mirror, framed Or (gold), on the division. A paper is affixed with red lacquer to the stucco wall at left, inscribed. ‘WIE DAT GHIJ SIT GHEDINCKT TE STERVE WILT IN V TIJT GODS RIJCK VERWERVE,’ reminding the viewer that all men are equal and advising him to remember his mortality if he wishes to reach the kingdom of heaven. The artist underscores this Memento mori message with the inclusion of a jawless skull, a traditional symbol of the inevitability of decay and death.

Pieter Jansz. Gaef, alias Spiegel was born in 1505⁄06, the son of Jan Gaef Jansz. and Lijsbeth Jansdr. or Lijsbeth Gerritsdr. van Alckmaer. He married Catrijn Pietersdr. van Neck, alias Coppit, who came from a regent family with interests in the trade of grain and gunpowder, among other things. Together, they had eight children. Their eldest son, Jacob Pietersz. Coppit, was born in 1545 and served as a member of the Amsterdam town council from 1591 until his death in 1629.

Infrared reflectography reveals how Dirck Jacobsz. rapidly laid out the sitter’s facial features with short strokes of a dry, carbon-based medium, paying particular attention to the placement of the nose and the contour of his proper right cheek. Similar staccato lines are used to articulate the hands in relation to the skull, while longer, more fluid lines are used for the garments. Notably, IRR shows an underlying coat of arms: Argent, two wings addorsed Sable – heraldry traditionally used by the Gaef family. It is likely that the coat of arms was altered during the sitter’s own lifetime, perhaps to incorporate the coat of arms of his mother’s family. Moreover, this change was possibly made soon after the painting was completed. The added octagonal golden mirror, in fact, is likely a reference to Pieter Jansz. Gaef’s house and his family name Spiegel – tellingly, it does not seem to appear on any other known Spiegel or Coppit coat of arms.

Comparison of the present portrait to Dirck Jacobsz’s earlier Portrait of Pompeius Occo (1483-1537), painted in circa 1531 (Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam; fig. 2) is illuminating. Equally unsigned, both portraits exhibit the same distinctive, almost sculptural treatment of the hands and faces. Moreover, Occo similarly rests his hand on a skull. Remarkably, close examination suggests that this is likely the same skull as that portrayed in the present portrait, suggesting that Dirck Jacobsz may have kept it for decades as a studio prop.

Dirck Jacobsz., Portrait of Pompeius Occo (1483-1537), circa 1531, oil on panel, h 66.5cm × w 55.1cm, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam. 

Notably, Pieter Jansz. Gaef was the great-grandfather of Oopjen Coppit (1611-1689), who married Maarten Soolmans (1613-1641) in 1633. Rembrandt van Rijn (1606-1669) painted their full-length wedding portraits in 1634, which were acquired by the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam and Musée du Louvre, Paris in 2016.

We are grateful to Dr. Matthias Ubl for endorsing the attribution to Dirck Jacobsz. on the basis of firsthand examination.