(Antwerp 1581 – 1641)
Samson imprisoned by the Philistines, oil on copper, 81 x 96.5 cm, unframed

The painting is a scaled-down version in the artist’s hand of the picture once in the ownership (1983) of the art dealers, Hoogsteder & Otto Naumann, New York.

Provenance: Collection of the banker, Baron von Bethmann, Königstein bei Frankfurt; Carl Spaeth, Frankfurt; thereafter his widow, married to Count Görtz, Frankfurt; West German private collection. Artus Wolffort was a painter of religious compositions and genre pictures. He has an important place in Flemish painting, between Rubens and van Dyck. He often drew his subjects from the Bible, in particular the Old Testament.

Literature: see ‘The Burlington Magazine’, June 1983, pp.385, 386. ill. no. 67.

Certificate: Dr Hans Vlieghe, Nationaal Centrum voor de plastische Kunsten van de 16de en den 17de Eeuw, 9 January 1991. Prof Vlieghe considers the present painting to be an original by Artus Woffort. He writes, ‘The fact that it is small in format should not put one off. Such secondary or even tertiary versions with considerably different dimensions occur in Wolffort’s oeuvre, as can be seen, for instance, in my essay of 1977.’

The painting is a scaled-down version in the artist’s hand of the picture once in the ownership (1983) of the art dealers, Hoogsteder & Otto Naumann, New York. Provenance: Collection of the banker, Baron von Bethmann, Königstein bei Frankfurt; Carl Spa