Fleeting Senses and Enduring Love: Lairesse and the Van Rijn Children. Lairesse and Portraiture

Gerard de Lairesse,  Allegory of the Senses, detail of three children, 1668,  Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum (Glasgow Museums)

Gerard de Lairesse (1640–1711) painted little more than a handful of portraits. A
relatively high proportion of these, however, especially in the period between 1668
and 1672, are portraits historiés, in which the sitter or sitters are in the guise of
historical, mythical, or allegorical subjects. In 2001, Glasgow Museums acquired
Lairesse’s Allegory of the Senses, signed and dated 1668. This article explores and
explains the complex iconography and unusually complete provenance of the
Glasgow painting and identifies the sitters as the three children of Pieter van Rijn
(1633–1712), Amsterdam merchant and marine auctioneer, and Elisabeth Bessels
(1634–1708).

DOI: 10.5092/jhna.2020.12.1.8

Acknowledgements

I have accumulated extensive debts of gratitude over the long gestation of this article and would like to thank the following for their assistance and advice: Peter Black, †Bob van den Bogaert, Remmelt Daalder, Emilie Gordenker, Vivien Hamilton, Jasper Hillegers, †Walter Liedtke, Norbert Middelkoop, †Richard Pilkington Jackson, Claudia Schipper, Jacob Simon, Polly Smith, Paul Taylor, Jaap van der Veen, and Rosemary Watt; staff at the Barber Institute of Fine Arts Library, Bodleian Library, University of Glasgow Library, Hammersmith & Fulham Archives, and National Art Library; and former colleagues at Glasgow Museums too numerous to mention. I am most grateful to Elmer Kolfin and Eric Jan Sluijter, and to the anonymous reviewers, for their many helpful suggestions. Above all, I am hugely indebted to Marten Jan Bok for his time and generosity in finding and documenting the crucial final pieces of the puzzle.   I would like to dedicate this article to my children, Gilson (b. 2012) and Kitty (b. 2014).

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Review: Peer Review (Double Blind)
DOI: 10.5092/jhna.2020.12.1.8
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Recommended Citation:
Robert Wenley, "Fleeting Senses and Enduring Love: Lairesse and the Van Rijn Children. Lairesse and Portraiture," Journal of Historians of Netherlandish Art 12:1 (Winter 2020) DOI: 10.5092/jhna.2020.12.1.8