Provenance:
Beris family, Naples,
1854 (according to a label to the back), as ' Rembrandt, Portrait of Henri,
Duke of Gloucester
and son of Charles 1st, disguised as Shepherd.
Architect and painter Salomon de Bray spent nearly his whole life in Haarlem,
where
Mannerist artists
Cornelis van Haarlem and
Hendrick Goltzius were
probably his first teachers. He painted mostly religious and mythological
scenes, along with portraits, landscapes, and
genre pictures. An active and accomplished draftsman,
De Bray made
architectural drawings and highly finished preliminary studies for paintings.
De Bray's
artistic development is not well documented. In 1635 he seemed to favor
half-length figures, which at that time had become rather old-fashioned. By
about 1640, his work showed the influence of Rembrandt van Rijn's chiaroscuro.
4 June 1984,
Sale, Paris, Hotel Drouot, Lot # 4 by François Heim.
16 June 1987, Sale, Angers,
of where acquirement by the father of the former owner.
1 July 2004, Paris, Christie's private sale sold by the son of the former owner.
Exhibit:
Montreal, Museum of
Fine Arts, and Toronto, Art Gallery Ontario of, Rembrandts and his/her/its
pupils,
9 January 23 February
1969, no. 33, ill.