The Story
) April 1690, (‘En zullen al mijn conterfeitsels, en van broeder Moses en van vader en moeder en bestevader en bestemoeder, … niet verkoft, maar voor de kinderen bewaart moeten worden’);{Houck 1899, p. } …; collection Thomas Jefferson Bryan (1802-70), New York, 1853;{Coll. cat. New York 1853, p. 11, no. 147 (‘portrait of William, Prince of Orange and King of England’) Coll. cat. New York 1853b, p. 88, no. } by whom donated to The New York Historical Society, 2 April 1867; periodically on loan to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, c.
1979-94;{McNeil Kettering 1995, p. } sale The New York Historical Society, New York (Sotheby’s), 12 January 1995, no.
Executed in height 76.2 cm x width 56.5 cm, measuring height: 76.2; width: 56.5, the surface rewards close looking. Gerard ter Borch builds the composition through layered glazes and a tightly controlled palette, letting cool shadows recede so that the warm, lit passages step forward. The brushwork shifts from the precise to the almost dissolved — a hallmark of mature Baroque practice.
“A silence so complete it becomes its own witness.”
