Picture yourself having just acquired an old master print (say, a Rembrandt etching) at an auction. The print is in a exceptional good state, and you bought it at a reasonable price (“reasonable” meaning in reasonable relation to the size of your wallet, of course). After the auction, this well know old print conaisseur which you watched lingering around the specimens shown at the pre-sale exhibition approaches you and tells you with that calm voice expressing a life full of old master print expertise: “Madam/Sir, I have to to tell you: your print has been Schweidlerized“.

Schweidlerized? What does he mean?

1. The print is a fake (“swindle”)
2. The print has been skillfully repaired, virtually invisible to the eye, or
3. The print was sold (at an auction etc.) at a much higher price than what it is actually worth.
   

Read on for the solution and the rediscovery of a tremendously valuable book.

“Anyone who has only a small amount of time available and thinks he might be able to finish my book on the streetcar, or somewhere else in between other activities, is better off leaving my book alone. It will not do him any good. It is not just an entertaining piece of literature, a pleasant chat in more or less beautiful words.“

Thus are the introducing words of the book “Die Instandsetzung von Kupferstichen, Zeichnungen, Büchern usw.”, published first in 1938 in Berlin, a book which has long been out of print. Roy Perkinson, Head of Paper Conservation at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston has done a very fine job in translating the text of the 1950 version and in adding eleven case studies (including woodcuts by Albrecht Altdorfer and Urs Graf; engravings by Albrecht Dürer, Marcantonio Raimondi,  Antonio del Pollaiuolo, Martin Schongauer, Lucas van Leyden and the Master of the Housebook,  and etchings by Rembrandt Harmensz. van Rijn and Anthony van Dyck). All quotations in this post are from this edition.

The author of the mentioned book is  the German restorer Max Schweidler, born 1885 in Berlin. The year of his death is unknown, which is not the only mystery surrounding his life. His brother, Carl (1884-1962) was said to be the even more skilled restorer, but he didn’t describe any of of his methods in a publication.

Both Carl and Max Schweidler had an extensive knowledge of how to repair age-related damages of works on paper in such a perfected way that later experts would have difficulties even in spotting them. Max Schweidler specifically pointed out the results of  “wrong ” (or at least different) restoration methods, thus the subtitle “Past Mistakes and New Methods…“  of his book. He admits that he had to be “rather pedantic about the details” of his methods, but he found the detailed explanations absolutely necessary in order to reach the ultimate goal of his understanding of restoration: “...transmitting these treasures in the best possible condition to future generations“.

What follows is a critical overview of  the methods of past restorers  and a meticulous account of his own methods.  Although there are inaccuracies (e.g. Schweidler’s knowledge of paper making) and procedures nowadays obsolete, Schweidler’s book can still be regarded as a seminal work in this area. Perkinson’s edition provides a cornucopia of facts about the manufacture of paper, the treatment (not necessarily removing)  stains, the cleaning of prints, drawings and books and the treatment of mounted prints and much more. Perkinson briefly also touches on the interesting question of where the limits of any restoration work are. He concludes that “… in the end it is not a problem that a repair was done so well as to be almost undetectable but rather that there was no disclosure of this fact “(p. 8).

So, if there are “Schweidlerized” prints, drawings or books in your collection: congratulations for being able to discern them and respect to the work of Max Schweidler, who was indeed capable to preserve those valuable items for future generations.

Max Schweidler: The Restoration of Engravings, Drawings, Books and other Works on Paper, 2nd edition, 1950, translated and edited by Roy Perkinson. The Getty Conservation Institute, Los Angeles,  2006.

The book is available directly from the Getty Conservation Institute or from Amazon.

Max Schweidler taking a sheet out of the tray (p. 49)

Another technical study to the engraving Battle of the Nudes by Antonio del Pollaiolo (case study 11 in Parkinson’s edition) was conducted by Moyna Stanton, Associate Conservator of Works of Art on Paper at the Cleveland Museum of Art. Her findings are available online: Pollaiuolo: Finding the Pieces of the Puzzle, where you will also find additional facts on the works of the Schweidler brothers.

An early impression of the aquatinta etching “Muchachos al avío” (“Lads making ready”) by Francisco de Goya was found in the kitchen of the former residence of Slobodan Milosevic in Beograd. The plate 11 of the series “Los Caprichos” has been confirmed to be a first impression, published in 1799.

The plate had been part of the collection of former President Josip Broz Tito, for whom the residence originally was built. At the moment it is both unclear how it got there and what the wherebouts of other “disappared” items from the mentioned collection are.

The etching “‘Tristes presentimientos de lo que ha de acontecer” (“Sad presentiments of what will happen”) by Francisco de Goya (1746-1828), which was stolen a month ago at an important Goya exhibition at the Fundación Gilberto Alzate Avendaño in Bogota, has been found in a hotel room in the same city, still in its original frame.

The etching is part of the series “Los desastres de la guerra” (Disasters of War) (1810-14) narrating the hardships of the Spanish liberation war against France.

Link to “El Tiempo” article (12.10.2008): Grabado de Goya robado el pasado mes de septiembre fue recuperado por las autoridades

Link to an article showing the corpus delicti (14.10.2008). This and some other articles erroneously speak of  “engravings”, although the Disasters of War prints are etchings (with the additional use of aquatint, dry point and burin). The use of “engraving” instead of “etching” seems to be a common mistake for news agencies, it happened also here.

“I spotted it and immediately knew that was the kind of thing I wanted: “The Agony in the Garden”. It was really a stunning piece. You could see the expression on Jesus’ face, how passionate it was. It’s above my bed.” Those are the words of Brahm Wachter, who bought this original Rembrandt etching at the 2003 Maastricht art fair (click on the thumbail to the left for a full size version of the etching). Now this alone probably wouldn’t be enough in order to be mentioned in todays art market news, weren’t there the fact that the collector was 13 years old at that time he bought it with his bar mitzvah money.

While market and investing oriented magazines like Forbes interpret this as the start to a successfull art investing career, I see it rather as the first steps of an art passionate, or an “art amateur” (from Latin amare, to love); despite the fact that Brahm is the son of George Wachter, worldwide head of the old masters department at Sotheby’s.

Link:

Curators From the Cradle: Marbles, Bugs and Warhols (The New York Times, May 13, 2004)

An etching by Rembrandt van Rijn, “Adam and Eve” (click on the left picture to see an enlarged version), has been stolen from an art gallery in Chicago. The suspected thieves are a couple who had briefly entered the gallery and left it, taken the etching with them. The etching dates from 1638 and is worth around 60′000 US$.

In some news articles the stolen print is labeled as “an engraving”, which is not correct. It is an etching. When you have a closer look at the full size version (click on the small picture above), you will discover a nice detail in the background: a small elephant. It is Hansken (1630-1655), an elephant which was shown across Europe in the 17th century.

Rembrandt van Rijn: Hansken (drawing, 1637)

An anonymous copper engraving from the 17th century shows Hansken’s manifold skills, which may also have impressed Rembrandt to include her (Hansken was a lady elephant) in a scene from the Bible.

Links:

Hilligoss Galleries in Chicago including a picture of the stolen item

Rembrandt stolen from Mag Mile gallery (Chicago Tribune) and followup.

17th Century Rembrandt Etching Stolen From Chicago Gallery (FoxNews)

On the reverse of the engraving and etching “Silence” by French engraver Laurent Cars (1699-1771) after the painting by Jean-Baptiste Greuze (1725-1805), a handwritten inscription was found. The only thing I found out so far was that it is in French, and that it starts with “Cette epreuve…” (“This proof…”). If anybody is able to provide a transcription, I would very appreciate it.

Click on the picture below too see a full-sized version of the inscription.

Laurent Cars after Jean-Baptise Greuze: Silence!

Note: This started as a reply to a comment of an earlier post ; since one can’t easily add formatting, pictures etc. in a comment, i decided to publish it in form of a post.

Nicolas (1739-1792) and his brother Robert (1754-1854) Delaunay (sometimes also referred to as De Launay) were both active as engravers/etchers in Paris. Nicolas, pupil of Louis-Simon Lempereur (1728-1808) and later entitled to Graveur du Roi (“Royal Engraver” of Louix XV), was one of the contributors of engravings to the 1773-83 edition of J. J. Rousseau’s Oeuvre Complètes (Complete Works) after designs of Jean Michel Moreau (also called Moreau le Jeune).

One of Nicolas Delaunays most popular compositions after Jean-Honoré Fragonard (1732-1806) is Les hasards heureux de l’escarpolette (“The Happy Accidents of a Child’s Swing“). Artheque cites also La bonne mère as one of his “big” compositions.

Jean-Honoré Fragonard painted several versions of La Bonne Mère (“The good mother“). Emma Barker parker puts the painting in a “genre galant” context, combining “eroticism and domesticity in a distinctly comic fashion” [2]. The young woman, supposedly to watch over the two small children, seems distracted by the white cat and the boy pouring water to her right. She does not exhibit the complete absorption in her maternal duties expressed in scenes by Chardin for example. The title La bonne mère is not by Fragonard, this is a later addition by the engraver Nicolas Delaunay. The title was subsequently also used for the painting, emphasizing the domestic component of the composition.

Jean-Honoré Fragonard, The good mother, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

Jean-Honoré Fragonard, La bonne mère, around 1770, private collection, USA.

The print La bonne mère by is a combined etching and engraving, Delaunay created it in 1779 [1], during the same time he had published a series of engravings/etchings depicting domestic scenes and maternal duties. This series included five mirrored prints after compositions by Fragonard (including L’Heureuse fécondité, Dites-donc, s’il-vous-plait, Les baignets ) and Le Bonheur du ménage, after Jean-Baptiste Le Prince (1734-1781) [3] .

La bonne mère is dedicated to the fermier-général , Ménage de Pressigny (“dédiée à Monsieur de Pressigny Conseiller Fermier Generale de sa Majesté”), who had owned the painting (“Tire du Cabinet de M: Menage de Pressigny”), shown above, now in a private collection. It appears together with the mentioned Les hasards heuereux de l’escarpolette on a price list issued by the engraver [4]. Both prints were a huge success already at that time. In the case of La bonne mère, the prints seemed almost to surpass the popularity of the painting, or at least the watercolor drawing by Fragonard of the same scene, (exhibited in 1781), which was praised as depicting “a topic, well known by the nice engraving by M. de Launay” [5].

______________________

[1] Emma Barker, Greuze and the Painting of Sentiment, 2005, p. 120.

[2] Emma Barker, Greuze and the Painting of Sentiment, 2005, p. 272, note 23.

[3] Jean Siméon Chardin 1699-1779: Werk, Herkunft, Wirkung, 1999, p. 415.

[4] Emma Barker, Greuze and the Painting of Sentiment, 2005, p. 133.

[5] Emma Barker, Greuze and the Painting of Sentiment, 2005, p. 274, note 54.