View of the Palace of Coudenberg in Brussels and its park, with the lower-lying town and the town hall in the background; A landscape with a country residence near a waterfront, with a town in the background (which due to the church spire, resembling that of the cathedral of Saint Rombout, might be identified as Malines), oil on copper, each 15 x 22 cm, framed (2)

Certificate:
Dr Ursula Härting, Hamm (2011).

Provenance:
An important Belgian private collection.

Dr Härting writes in her certificate: “I believe that the two unsigned topographic views on copper…are early compositions by the versatile artist Adriaen Pietersz. van de Venne, and that they were probably painted between 1610 and 1615. Very few views of the Brussels palace, let alone specimens dating from such an early period, have survived. Regardless of any attribution, the present view of Coudenberg Palace in Brussels therefore represents a rare and fascinating document. Adriaen van de Venne, who was not only an excellent draughtsman and painter, but also a poet, is documented to have been in Antwerp in 1607; between 1614 and 1624, he lived in Middelburg, before moving to The Hague in 1625. It is not known where he spent the time between 1607 and 1614. And early paintings from this period that are either dated or securely attributable to him and that would compare to the two small panels are lacking… Several such small-sized copper panels by Van de Venne depicting aristocratic fêtes set in front of castles have survived. Two outstanding examples by van de Venne of such elegant fêtes in the manner of Brueghel, both of which date from 1619, are preserved in the J. Paul Getty Museum. Since the view of the palace in Brussels includes the gallery building, to which a second storey was added, 1610 is a terminus post quem for the painting in question...”

The fortified castle and then palace was located on Coudenberg Hill above the city of Brussels from the 12th Century until its destruction in the 18th Century. It served as a residence, first to the counts of Leuven, then to the dukes of Brabant and Burgundy, and finally to members of the House of Habsburg. In the palace’s ‘Aula Magna’, the future Emperor Charles V was officially declared to have come of age in 1515. Forty years later, it was in the same place that he abdicated the Spanish throne and consequently also his imperials honours in favour of his son, Philip. Under Charles V, the palace was expanded. In order to honour the memory of his parents, the emperor had the ‘Grande Chapelle’ built in the Late Gothic style in which the treasure of the Order of the Golden Fleece would be kept. In the 17th Century, the governors Albrecht VII of Austria and Isabella Clara Eugenia of Spain had the palace restored and its gardens expanded, under the participation of such artists as Jan Brueghel the Elder and Peter Paul Rubens. From 1724 on, Archduchess Maria Elizabeth of Austria, the regent governor and sister of Emperor Charles VI, resided in the palace. In the night from 3 to 4 February 1731, her private apartments caught fire and the palace was almost completely destroyed. Its splendour, once famous throughout Europe, had vanished. Due to a lack of financial means, the ruins of the palace were only removed in 1774, under the governor Duke Charles Alexander of Lorraine. The Royal Square or Place Royal, today surrounded by neo-classical structures, was built on top of them. One of the rare depictions of the lost Palace of Coudenberg has now been rediscovered in the form of the present painting by Adriaen van de Venne. The present paintings number among the rare landscape paintings by Adriaen van de Venne in the manner of Jan Brueghel the Elder.