Bulletin du Musée National de Varsovie (19.1978)

h) Costume details, characteristic for the thirties of the 17th c. and comparison with other
works by Nason from the period between 1646—1649, suggest that the date was eithei
wrongly deciphered or faked. Possibly confounded in the 1940 catalogue4 with another
picture by Nason signed "PNason 1648" (see: eat. No. 5) which despite its long known
signature was described in this catalogue as an anonymous work. On the basis of a pho-
tograph only, it can be stated that the authorship of Nason must be eliminated if the picture
was really painted in 1648.

i) 1. Spis obrazów znajdujących się w Galerii i pokojach Pałacu Wilanowskiego, Warszawa, 1834, no. 397; 2. Skimbrowricz H.,
Gerson W., Wilanów dawny i teraźniejszy..., Warszawa, 1847, p. 59; 3. Łuniński, Wilanów, Warszawa, 1915, p. 23, ill.;
4. Sichergcstellte Kunslwerke, no. 70, ill.; 5. Tomkiewicz, 1950, no. 138, ill.; 6. J. Białostocki, Walicki, 1956, no. 260, il.

No. 13 Porlrait of an Unknown Man (fig. 24)

a) o.p. 49,5x40 cm.; MNW, inv. no. 129759

b) not signed

c) acąuired in 1948 from private hands

d) good; restored

e) unknown

f) unknown

g) Xiii 1956 the picture was exhibited in the MNW as the Porlrait of an unknown man by Adriaen
van der Werff. Also the links with C. Netscher were stressed (see: the card-index of the
MNW). A. Dobrzycka aecepted it for a portrait of Friedrich Willem von Hohenzollern and
ascribed it to Pieter Nason, linking with Nason's portrait of the elector from Charlottenburg
(inv. no. 3312). Comparing the Warsaw picture with another portrait of the elector from
the Beilin Castle, lost after 1945 (cat. no 1016) she discovered similarities in the composi-
tion and in some costume details — the same sabre and the view of the same mountains
in the background; the author dated it from the sixties of the 17th c.1.

h) The manner of painting and the colour composition contradict Dobrzycka's attribution.
The fine and soft brushwork producing the effect of an even texture as well as colours suavely

' permeating and softened with warm, greyish glazes bring to one's mind the brilliant techni-
que of Gerrit Dou. In the face, painted in numerous colours, in shiny details of the costume
and the hilt of the sabie, there is also something of the spi-it of Ter Borch's art. Moreover,
the pink and orange glow of the sky, the singular drawing of the hand, the painterly feathers
of the helmet as well as the expressive brushwork of the reflections on the armour are foreign
to Pieter Nason's style. The lack of typical monumentality characteristic for this kind of
Nason's portraits, the painterly treatment of particular parts of the picture, smali forms
differentiated not in a linear but in a colouristic manner, rather successful placing of the
figurę in the neutral ground of the slope and the pronounced depth of the landscape view
corresponding with the very figurę both in its colour rangę and capricious forms, contradict
Nason's authorship. The formal ąualities, on the other hand, could be perceived in works
of another Hague portraitist — Caspar Netscher. A modest — in the case of this artist —
painterly glitter of reflections in particular fragments of the figurę and drapery would in-
dicate a rather early date of the portrait's execution, i.e. the beginning of the seventies of
the 17th c. Such date seems most justified also because of the streaks of reflections
applied on the torso part of the armour, characteristic for the later works of C. Netscher.
They are painted with bold and elear brush strokes in blue, white, pink and red colours.

45