Instytut Sztuki (Warschau) [Hrsg.]; Państwowy Instytut Sztuki (bis 1959) [Hrsg.]; Stowarzyszenie Historyków Sztuki [Hrsg.]: Biuletyn Historii Sztuki (67.2005)

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Anna Grochowska-Angelus, Katarzyna Novljaković

history of the painting is generally known and has been thoroughly analysed.6 It appeared in
Poland for the first time in 1774, brought here by a French painter Jean-Pierre Norblin de la
Gourdaine, who came to Warsaw in the same year on invitation from the Czartoryski family.
Referred to in Polish sources as Jan Piotr Norblin, the artist spent 30 years in this country, which
became his second homeland, before his return to France in 1804.7 It remains undisclosed when,
and in what circumstances the painting became the property of Anna Tyszkiewicz Potocka, Dunin-
Wąsowicz. It was through her that the painting entered the Czartoryski collection, probably in
1813, which prince Adam Jerzy mentions in his diary. In the catalogue of the Gothic House at
Puławy,8 Rembrandfs landscape is numbered 1291 and labelled 'The Storm Sight Oil Painting by
Rembrandt'. The catalogue code inscribed on the reverse of the painting, 'C.EC.DG. 1291' (i.e.
Collection of Elżbieta Czartoryska Dom Gotycki 1291), must date from that time. Following the
defeat of the Polish November Insurrection the painting remained hidden in Sieniawa before its
transfer to the Hotel Lambert in Paris a dozen or so years later. In 1878 the painting returned to
Cracow, to the museum founded by Władysław Czartoryski.9 The fact that two international mo-
nographic exhibitions borrowed the painting, one held in 1898 in Amsterdam and the other in
1899 in London,10 affirms the beginning of a broader interest in the work. During World War 1 the
painting was evacuated, together with other valuable exhibits from the collection, to Dresden.
During World War II it was commandeered by the Nazis. After the war, Dr. Karol Estreicher
discovered in Munich the painting and had it returned to the Czartoryski Museum.
During the conservation of the painting, also the reverse has been thoroughly examined." A
seal has been found and interpreted in the bottom left corner, which comprises an interesting
supplement to the history of the painting. The seal shows the coat of arms of the so-called Ślepow-
ron, emblem of the Krasiński family, from which Maria Ludwika (1883-1958) was descended,
wife from 1901 of Adam Ludwik Czartoryski (1872-1937), owner of Czartoryski Museum. The
seal had been impressed before the painting's deposition in Dresden in 1914. As there is also an
ink stamp on the reverse of the panel recording the words: 'Furstlich. Czartoryski' schen, Majorat
Gołuchów', it is possible that the duchess made a tactical move by having the painting stamped
with the seal of Gołuchowski Castle collection to ensure that the deposit was not considered
foreign (coming from the Austrian Empire), but as domestic (coming from the territory of the
German Empire). This would enable safe depositing and collecting of the objects after the war.12
The composition depicts a stormy landscape. Several researchers have tried to define which
storm phase is actually being presented on the panel.13 In the opinion of Antoni Ziemba14 it is the
action, movement and the struggle of light and dusk, being independent of the storm phase, that
seem most important, for they represent the symbolic meaning of the evangelical parable. In order

6 Ibid., pp. 108-30. The history of the painting since the 18th century is known. It was sold during the auction of M.D. van
Eversdijck's collection in Hague in 1766 to de Cros. Resold again in 1774 in Paris from the collection Vassal de St.
Hubert to Jan Piotr Norblin.
7 Norblin is known to have purchased other pictures from Vassal de St. Hubert, for which he failed to find buyers in
Poland, having them brought back to France; e.g. Boucher's View of Tivoli, as well as by Watteau, Hubert Robert,
Etienne Theolon. See: T.F. DE ROSSET, Obraz wyobrażający różne inne obrazy na wiele sposobów: malarstwo fran-
cuskie i jego mistrzowie w Polsce XVII i XVIII wieku, [in:] Cztery wieki malarstwa francuskiego, exhib. cat., Royal
Castle, Warszawa, 2005; idem, Polskie kolekcje i zbiory artystyczne we Francji w latach 1795-1919, Toruń, pp. 17-20.
8 Entitled The Account of the Reminders Kept in the Gothic House in Pulawy, Warsaw, 1828, p. 106.
9 The Czartoryski Library (followed by BCzart.), rkps./ms. 12723
10 BCzart. "Księga Czynności" of the Czartoiyski Museum, rkps./ms. 12346, 11.08.1898; 10.03.1899; 28.031899.
11 Cf.: ROSTWOROWSKI, op. cit., fn. 19, p. 142.
12 A suggestion made by J. Nowak, the manager of the Manuscript Department of the Czartoryski Library.
13 According to Marek Rostworowski it is an after-storm landscape, op. cit. page 12. While according to A. ZAŁUSKI,
'Landscape with the Parable of a Merciful Samaritan and the Question of its Expression' (no trans.), BHS, XVIII,1956/
3 3, pp. 370-383, claims that the composition presents a landscape before a storm.
14 Cf.: ZIEMBA, 1988, op. cit., p. 33.