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Lot Essay
Swanenburg was a talented follower of Hieronymus Bosch and this demonic scene is typical of the works on which he built his reputation. Having probably received his early training as a painter in the studio of his father, Isaac Claesz. van Swanenburg, at around twenty years of age, Jacob left Leiden for Italy in circa 1591, spending some years in Venice and Rome before settling in Naples. He was clearly already practicing in this genre while in Italy, since he was brought before the Inquisition in Naples in 1608 for displaying a large canvas outside his shop in which witches and devils were engaged in perverse activities. He returned to his native Leiden in 1618 following the death of his father, where he became the first teacher of the young Rembrandt.
Swanenburg’s oeuvre has yet to be fully understood, with only one known signed work, a View of St. Peter's Square in Rome, dated 1628 (Copenhagen, Statens Museum for Kunst) and at least eight hellish scenes connected with the artist. It is from his body of work depicting hellish visions that he achieved his greatest success, with the biographer Jan Janszoon Orlers recounting that in ‘his native city, and in other cities, he pleased with his art all the connoisseurs who commissioned him’ (in A. Golahny, Rembrandt's Reading: The Artist's Bookshelf of Ancient Poetry and History, Amsterdam, 2014, p. 60).
While Bosch’s devilish images were clearly an inspiration for Swanenburg, this painting shows more directly the influence of Jan Breughel the Elder’s work in this genre, such as his Christ's Descent into Limbo of 1597 (a collaboration with Hans Rottenhammer; The Hague, Mauritshuis; fig. 1), comparable in the billowing clouds of smoke, clustered nude figures, monsters and ancient ruins aflame in the background. Following his time in Naples, Swanenburg was certainly familiar with ancient ruins, with the large arches in several of his inferno paintings resembling the ruins of Pozzuoli, and the billowing clouds recalling the steam emanating from the sulphur springs of Solfatara.
Christ’s Descent into Limbo was, like many Christian iconographies that were popularised during the Middle Ages, not based on the Biblical account of His life. The Harrowing of Hell, as it was also known, was described in the Gospel of Nicodemus in the Apocrypha, from which it was later adapted and disseminated in Jacobus de Voragine’s Legenda Aurea. Following His Crucifixion, Christ descended in triumph into Hell to bring salvation to the righteous who had died since the beginning of the world. Arriving at the entrance of Hell, He called out in a voice ‘as of thunder ... Lift up your gates ... and the King of Glory shall come in’ (Gospel of Nicodemus, 16:1).
Drs. Luuk Pijl proposed the attribution to Jacob Isaacsz. van Swanenburg at the time of the 2010 sale.
Swanenburg’s oeuvre has yet to be fully understood, with only one known signed work, a View of St. Peter's Square in Rome, dated 1628 (Copenhagen, Statens Museum for Kunst) and at least eight hellish scenes connected with the artist. It is from his body of work depicting hellish visions that he achieved his greatest success, with the biographer Jan Janszoon Orlers recounting that in ‘his native city, and in other cities, he pleased with his art all the connoisseurs who commissioned him’ (in A. Golahny, Rembrandt's Reading: The Artist's Bookshelf of Ancient Poetry and History, Amsterdam, 2014, p. 60).
While Bosch’s devilish images were clearly an inspiration for Swanenburg, this painting shows more directly the influence of Jan Breughel the Elder’s work in this genre, such as his Christ's Descent into Limbo of 1597 (a collaboration with Hans Rottenhammer; The Hague, Mauritshuis; fig. 1), comparable in the billowing clouds of smoke, clustered nude figures, monsters and ancient ruins aflame in the background. Following his time in Naples, Swanenburg was certainly familiar with ancient ruins, with the large arches in several of his inferno paintings resembling the ruins of Pozzuoli, and the billowing clouds recalling the steam emanating from the sulphur springs of Solfatara.
Christ’s Descent into Limbo was, like many Christian iconographies that were popularised during the Middle Ages, not based on the Biblical account of His life. The Harrowing of Hell, as it was also known, was described in the Gospel of Nicodemus in the Apocrypha, from which it was later adapted and disseminated in Jacobus de Voragine’s Legenda Aurea. Following His Crucifixion, Christ descended in triumph into Hell to bring salvation to the righteous who had died since the beginning of the world. Arriving at the entrance of Hell, He called out in a voice ‘as of thunder ... Lift up your gates ... and the King of Glory shall come in’ (Gospel of Nicodemus, 16:1).
Drs. Luuk Pijl proposed the attribution to Jacob Isaacsz. van Swanenburg at the time of the 2010 sale.