JACOB WILLEMSZ DE WET (HAARLEM, VERS 1610-1675)

Lot 19
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Estimation :
3000 - 4000 EUR
Result with fees
Result : 3 295EUR
JACOB WILLEMSZ DE WET (HAARLEM, VERS 1610-1675)
The Adoration of the Golden Calf Signed lower right Oil on panel 41 x 51 cm Provenance Mahler Collection The Mahler Collection was established in Vienna, capital of the former Austro-Hungarian Empire, nearly 120 years ago. The paintings in the collection were acquired by Professor Eduard Mahler, a man who reflected the European Zeitgeist of the late 19th century. This eminent figure was a historian with a passion for the notion of time, which he examined in all its complexity through his profession as a mathematician and astronomer. Among his publications, Astronomical Research on the Darkness of the Wounds of Egypt in the Bible and in the Hebrew Scriptures (1885) and The Biblical Chronology and the Hebrew Understanding of Time (1887) testify to his fascination with Jewish sacredness and history, as well as with the various ways in which the history of humanity can be told. The presence of the two portraits presented in this collection is therefore no coincidence. The old rabbi, fascinating in his respectful setting and mysterious aura, and the man in the beret, so close to the viewer, with his attractive and surprising gaze tell the story of time and mankind, both generically and individually. Professor Mahler's daughter left Austria in the 1930s, as did Sigmund Freud and Stefan Zweig, among many others, to escape from Nazism, and spent the rest of her life in Brazil. These paintings accompanied this prestigious family into the brilliant salons of Viennese high society and into Brazilian exile. Belonging to the professor's great-grandniece, the two paintings and their intriguing faces travelled four centuries and several continents before reaching us.
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