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Nicolaas Pietersz Berchem

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Nicolaas Pietersz Berchem
1620-1683
Shepherdess Remonstrating with a Man Beating an Ass
Pen and brown ink and wash, (with some opaque white in right foreground), over graphite, on paper.
9 1/2 x 13 13/16 inches (240 x 350 mm)
Purchased by Pierpont Morgan (1837-1913) in 1909.
I, 139a
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Inscription: 

Signed at lower right, in brown ink, "Berchem. F". Numbered on the verso, in lower left corner, in dark brown ink, "III". Inscribed on mount, underneath drawing, by Alfred Huth (?), in brown ink, "Le coup de pied de l'âne. Vers la gauche sur le / premier plan, cet animal lance une ruade: derrière lui, un berger se dispose / à le frapper de son bâtu. Montée sur un malet au milieu de la composition, une femme / regarde cette scène: près d'elle sont divers animaux vers la droite: au bas de cette côté, la / signature du maïtre. Cette production d'un admirable effet, est depincé à la plume & lavée au bistre. / H. 24c.2. L35c.2m. / Copied from the Catalogue of original Drawings of the Great Dutch Masters / belonging to a celebrated collect: the Chevalier de Claussin. No. 7 of Catalogue which is in my hands. / Bought a few days after the sale of Mr. Henry Artaria of Paris whence it was knocked down. Dec: 1844. / AH".; and in the same hand further below at left, "600".
Watermark: Fleur-de-lis above a shield with a bend, over 4 adn letters "WR" (similar to Heawood, no. 66: [n.d.; van de Velde drawing at the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich]). Center diagonal line making bend has been bent, number 4 is reversed.

Provenance: 
Henry Artaria, Paris (according to inscription on mount); A.H. (possibly Alfred Huth; Lugt S. 129b); Charles Fairfax Murray (1849-1919), London and Florence; from whom purchased through Galerie Alexandre Imbert, Rome, in 1909 by Pierpont Morgan (1837-1913), New York (no mark; see Lugt 1509); his son, J. P. Morgan, Jr. (1867-1943), New York.
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Associated names: 

Artaria, Henry, former owner.
Huth, Alfred, former owner.
Murray, Charles Fairfax, 1849-1919, former owner.
Morgan, J. Pierpont (John Pierpont), 1837-1913, former owner.

Bibliography: 

Jane Shoaf Turner, with contributions by Felice Stampfle, Dutch Drawings in the Pierpont Morgan Library: Seventeenth to Nineteenth Centuries, New York, 2006, cat. no. 25.

Catalog link: 
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Artist page: 
Berchem, Nicolaas Pietersz
School: 
Dutch
Century: 
17th century
Classification: 
Drawing
Department: 
Drawings and Prints