ARTUS WOLFFORDT
(Flemish, 1581 – 1641)

Esther in the Women’s House of Ahasuerus

Oil on panel
19 ¾ x 29 ½ inches (50.2 x 74.9 cm)

Born in Antwerp, Artus Wolffordt received his training in Dordrecht where he became a master in 1603 at the age of twenty-two. He returned to his native city in 1615 and initially worked as an assistant to Otto van Veen. By 1617, he had received various important commissions, including the altarpieces of the Ascension and Assumption of the Virgin for the Church of St. Paul in Antwerp. The majority of Wolffordt’s oeuvre, however, consists of compositions intended for the open market and private individuals.  Several paintings (such as his series of the Twelve Apostles, the Four Evangelists, and Four Fathers of the Church) exist in various versions, of differing quality, suggesting that Wolffordt maintained a workshop. Two of his assistants, Pieter van Lint and Pieter van Mol, are in fact known to have made replicas of his paintings and were both greatly influenced by him.

The present painting was first identified as a work of Wolffordt’s by Professor Leonard Slatkes, in February 2001. The existence of perhaps as many as ten versions of the composition attests to its evident popularity. Four of these are in public collections in Europe: the Victoria & Albert Museum, London, (Inv. D. 10); the Palazzo Vecchio Florence; the Staatliche Gemäldegalerie in Cassel (No. 281); and at Wilton House, England.[1] A signed version was sold in The Hague in 1942 and other examples have been recorded in the Adalbert von Lanna Collection near Prague, the Frederick Stern Collection in Los Angeles, a Swedish Private Collection, and on the art market, Heidelberg.[2] It is possible that the either the Los Angeles or Prague versions (assuming that they are distinct) may be identifiable with the present panel.

[1] Hans Vlieghe, “Zwischen van Veen und Rubens: Artus Wolffort (1581-1641), ein vergessener Antwerpener Maler,” Wallraf-Richartz Jahrbuch, xxxix (1977), pp. 93-136, esp. 121-124.

[2] Sale, Van Marle & Bignell, The Hague, 26 July 1942, lot 70, signed “AWolfordt”; Sale, Collection Baron Adalbert von Lanna, as published in Kat. der Staatlichen Gemäldegalerie zu Kassel, (Kassel, 1958), p. 176, no. 281; Los Angeles, Collection Frederick Stern as published in H. Vlieghe, op. cit., p. 123, n. 52; Sale, H. Tenner, Heidelberg, 26 October 1963, lot 36; Private Collection, Sweden, rpd. in J. Held, “Noch einmal Artus Wolffort.” Wallraf-Richartz Jahrbuch, xlii (1981), pp. 143-56.