22 - Exceptional bottle with calligraphy

Exceptional bottle with calligraphy Netherlands, last quarter of the 17th century Calligraphy likely by Bastiaan Boers (1650–1713) H. 19 cm (with stopper) Provenance: Acquired on the London art market in 1980; according to information provided at the time, it came from the collection of Professor Joseph Philippe, Liège. Bibliography: Franciscus Gerardus Albertus Maria (F.G.A.M.) Smit, *Uniquely Dutch Eighteenth-Century Stipple-Engravings on Glass*. Peterborough, 1989 (privately published). The bottle is made of pale green transparent glass, engraved with a diamond point to bear a calligraphic inscription: *Maat in wyn is medecijn* (“Wine consumed in moderation is a remedy”), taken from Ecclesiastes: “Wine is like life to man, if drunk in moderation.” (Eccl. 31:27). It is topped with a silver stopper, connected by a chain to a silver ring encircling the neck. Condition: In perfect condition. The glass contains numerous small air bubbles, and the base shows the usual signs of wear. The sisters Anna and Maria Roemers Visscher are among the first identified artists to have practiced calligraphic engraving on glass. The few surviving works, most of which date from the second quarter of the 17th century, attest to their remarkable virtuosity. Their known body of work consists exclusively of roemers, whose rounded, bulbous shape lends itself particularly well to the fluid lines and cursive compositions of calligraphic writing. The transparency of the green glass allows for a dual reading of the inscription: it gradually becomes legible as the viewer rotates the glass, while the letters on the opposite side appear through the glass, creating an effect of layering and movement. In the 17th century, calligraphic engraving on glass was an art form almost exclusively Dutch, practiced mainly by cultured amateurs as an intellectual pastime. Its most prolific practitioner was Willem van Heemskerk (1613–1693), based in Leiden, who likely became familiar with this technique during the time Anna Visscher resided in that city. During the 1670s and 1680s, he engraved numerous plates, glasses, and bottles, which he took care to sign and date. Among the other calligraphic engravers active in the second half of the 17th century was Anna Maria van Schurman, a scholar renowned for her mastery of many languages, to whom several engraved glasses are attributed. We also know of the works of three masters of handwriting and calligraphers who simultaneously served as teachers: Bastiaan Boers (1650–1713), François Crama (1637–1718), and Mattheus Petit, who was active in Leiden around 1680–1690. Maarten Boers, Bastiaan’s son, may also have practiced this art. While Petit’s engravings generally appear less polished than those of Heemskerk, François Crama and Bastiaan Boers can be considered artists of comparable talent. The Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen in Rotterdam holds, in particular, a bottle dated 1687 and engraved by Boers (inv. 106 KN&V), which bears remarkable similarities to our example, particularly the characteristic small teardrop-shaped dots at the ends of certain letters (fig. 1). These similarities suggest an attribution to Bastiaan Boers, though this cannot be confirmed. The absence of a signature, however, makes an attribution to Heemskerk unlikely, as he was in the habit of systematically signing and dating his works, as seen, for example, on the bottle dated 1686 held at the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna (inv. 10213) or the one dated 1683 held at the De Lakenhal Museum in Leiden (inv. 4124; fig. 2), which also bears an inscription taken from Ecclesiastes (Eccl. 3:12). According to the catalog raisonné compiled by F. G. A. M. Smit, only 28 green glass bottles of this shape, adorned with calligraphic inscriptions, were listed at that time (see Smit, p. 14). According to our research, only two—including the example presented here—were still in identified private hands. These bottles now constitute a particularly rare group on the art market. To our knowledge, five 17th-century green-glass bottles with calligraphic inscriptions have been offered at auction over the past fifty years, three of which have since entered public collections.