Heimbach: Better in the dark
Certainly the old Dutch masters knew their way around the shadows, but few people would guess that “A Young Girl Wearing a Turban and Holding a Candle” was painted in the mid-1600s.
The other surprise is that it’s by one of their German students, Wolfgang Heimbach (ca 1615-78), better known for his fawning scenes of Danish royalty, and a man whose stature in art history is such that you can buy this oil at a Sotheby’s auction in London on December 4 for maybe £30,000.
“Heimbach’s art can seem naivistic [sic],” admits the Rosenborg on its website. That certainly applies to the pieces on view at that spectacular former royal residence in Copenhagen, a couple of which are shown further down in this post.
But Heimbach craved realism, and got himself off to Italy for a decade of following around people carrying lamps and candles. The chiaroscuro drama is impressive. Evidently the Galleria Doria-Pamphili in Rome has a matched set: “Young Girl with an Oil Lamp” and “Young Man with an Oil Lamp”.
Here, and in a pair of details below, is “Der Kranke”, from 1669, which my language software informs me actually means “The Patient”, not the doctor. Pretty maudlin stuff.
A native of Oldenburg in Germany but trained in Holland, Heimbach was a deaf mute who could read and write several languages. In Denmark he was a favourite of Frederik III and Queen Sophie Amalie, not least for portraying the king at the moment of victory in battle with the clouds above opening and an angel riding a sunbeam out to congratulate him.
In stark contrast to the mystery girl above, here’s the noisy, roiling “Paying Homage to the Hereditary King in Front of the Castle of Copenhagen, 18th October, 1660″, done six years after the fact. Heimbach actually decided he ought to be in there too — he’s the speck in the lower left corner, waving his hat.
