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Image Not Available for An Elegant Company in a Garden
An Elegant Company in a Garden
Image Not Available for An Elegant Company in a Garden

An Elegant Company in a Garden

Esaias van de Velde (Dutch, 1587–1630)
1614
Medium/TechniqueOil on canvas
Dimensions52.1 × 85.7 cm (20 1/2 × 33 3/4 in.)
Framed: 72 × 106 cm (28 3/8 × 41 3/4 in.)
Credit LinePromised gift of Rose-Marie and Eijk van Otterloo, in support of the Center for Netherlandish Art
Accession numberL-R 55.2018
On View
On view
ClassificationsPaintings
Collections
ProvenanceBy 1940, Gustaaf Hamburger (b. 1887 - d. 1977) and Clara Bertha (Gerzon) Hamburger (b. 1900 - d. 2007), Laaren, The Netherlands; October 9, 1942 confiscated as “enemy property” by the Dienststelle Mühlmann and sold for fl. 3500 through Dr. Hans A. Wetzlar (dealer; b. 1894 – d. 1976), Amsterdam to Hermann Goering (b. 1893 – d. 1946), Carinhall [see note 1]; February 17, 1945, taken by train to Veldenstein Castle, Neuhaus, Germany [see note 2]; April 1945, taken by train to Berchtesgaden [see note 3]; July 29, 1945, recovered by Allied forces from Berchtesgaden and taken to the Munich Central Collecting Point (MCCP no. 5817/Berchtesgaden 769) [see note 4]; November 5, 1946 released from the MCCP to Amsterdam, and given to the custody of the Stichting Nederlands Kunstbezit [see note 5]; restituted by the Stichting Nederlandsch Kunstbezit to Gustaaf Hamburger; by descent to his heirs; April 15, 2008, Gustaaf Hamburger sale, Christie’s, New York, lot 24. Johnny van Haeften, Ltd., London; 2008, sold by van Haeften to Eijk and Rose-Marie van Otterloo, Marblehead, MA.

NOTES:
[1] In August 1940, Jewish art collector Gustaaf Hamburger and his family escaped to Portugal and then to the United States, leaving most of their possessions in the Netherlands. Their property in Laren and elsewhere was designated "enemy property" by the Dienststelle (Special Office) Mühlmann, confiscated, and sold. For the sale to Goering, see Consolidated Interrogation Report no. 2 (Goering Collection), p. 87. National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, MD, Microfilm Publication M1782, Reports by the Art Looting Investigation Unit, Roll 10F1.

[2] Between February and April 1945, Goering moved his art collection from Carinhall, his residence near Berlin, to other properties he owned in the south of Germany. This painting appears on a 1945 inventory of works of art taken to Veldenstein, p. 12, no. 304. Goering, Hermann: Paintings from Veldenstein. National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, MD, Microfilm Publication M1946, Administrative Records from the Munich Central Collecting Point, Roll 127.

[3] Berchtesgaden Inventory (1945), no. 15. Goering: Art Museum Unterstein, Berchtesgaden. National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, MD, Microfilm Publication 1947, Administrative Files, Wiesbaden Central Collecting Point, Roll 81.

[4] Allied troops established collecting points where looted works of art could be identified for eventual restitution to their rightful owners. This painting came into the Munich Central Collecting Point in 1945 from Berchtesgaden (MCCP no. 5817).

[5] According to the 2008 Christie's catalogue. At the Munich Central Collecting Point, the painting was identified as coming from Hans Wetzlar, and not the Hamburgers. For that reason, it was not returned to them right away, but transferred to the Stichting Nederlandsch Kunstbezit (SNK, Foundation for Netherlandish Art Property), which after World War II was assigned the task of recuperating looted artworks from abroad and returning them to their rightful owners in the Netherlands.