242 - Jacob Hermann HAGBOLT (1775–1849)

Jacob Hermann HAGBOLT (1775–1849) Portrait of Louis Bonaparte, King of Holland (1810). Polychrome wax. In a blackened wood and gilded bronze frame, designed for hanging. Label on the reverse: “J. Hagbolt Portraiteur in Was...”. H. 7 x W. 6 cm. Frame: H. 20.5 x W. 18 cm. Provenance Formerly in the collection of Count and Countess Charles-André Colonna Walewski. Exhibition Amsterdam, Exhibition of Living Masters, 1810, no. 195: “The Portrait of King Louis Napoleon, colored, in a medallion” (“Het Portrait van Koning Lodewyk Napoleon, gekleurd, in Medaillon, door Hachbolt [sic]”). History Sculptor and wax modeler Jacob Hagbolt was born on April 17, 1775, near Duisburg. He trained in Cologne under Caspar Bernhard Hardy, a renowned master of the art of wax modeling. In 1803, he moved to Holland and settled in Amsterdam, where his polychrome wax profile portraits were met with great success, particularly among Louis Bonaparte, brother of Napoleon I and the new king of Holland. A portrait similar to the one before us, now in the Antoine-Lécuyer Museum in Saint-Quentin (ill. 1), was in fact acquired by the sovereign, who subsequently gave it to the Count of Lowendal. This provenance allows us to date the work to between 1806, the year Louis ascended the throne, and 1808, the year of the count’s death. Bolstered by this royal favor, Hagbolt presented our work at the Amsterdam Exhibition of Living Masters in 1810. Established in 1808 by Louis on the model of the Paris Salon, the exhibition opened that fall, a few months after the king’s abdication in favor of his son and the annexation of Holland to the Empire (July 1810). Hagbolt nonetheless demonstrated his loyalty to the former sovereign: in addition to our wax figure, he exhibited a bust of Louis of Holland, now in the Haarlem Municipal Museum (ill. 2), which was reproduced through plaster casts, as evidenced by the example at the De Lakenhal Museum in Leiden (ill. 3). Hagbolt regularly participated in exhibitions in Amsterdam until 1825. Beginning in 1826, he turned his attention to England and exhibited at the Royal Academy in London until 1833. His works captivated the public there, and many of them are now part of prestigious British collections, notably at the Victoria and Albert Museum. He died in Cologne in 1849, leaving behind a body of work remarkable for its mastery of polychromy. The restoration of the Saint-Quentin piece has provided a better understanding of the materiality of these rather rare works. Each type of wax used to create the portrait is dyed throughout, according to a traditional technique inherited from the Italian Renaissance. The various colored waxes are then applied successively into a hollow mold, allowing for a delicate rendering of the facial nuances. Related Works - Jacob Hagbolt, Portrait of Louis Bonaparte, King of Holland, shown in a bust in left profile, 1806–1808, Saint-Quentin, Antoine Lécuyer Museum, inv. 2008.13.1 FA (ill. 1). - Jacob Hagbolt, Bust of King Louis Bonaparte, 1810, Haarlem, Municipal Museum (ill. 2). - After Jacob Hagbolt, Bust of King Louis Bonaparte, Leiden, Museum De Lakenhal, inv. 3294 (ill. 3). Bibliography - GIJSBERTI HODENPIJL, C. F., “De Fransche overheersching. I,” Elsevier’s Geïllustreerd Maandschrift, XX, vol. XXXIX, Amsterdam, Uitgevers-Maatschappij Elsevier, 1910, p. 250. - IMMERZEEL, Johannes, The Lives and Works of Dutch and Flemish Painters, Sculptors, Engravers, and Architects, from the Beginning of the Fifteenth Century to the Present, vol. II, Amsterdam, J. C. van Kesteren, 1843, p. 8. - KRAMM, Christiaan, The Lives and Works of Dutch and Flemish Painters, Sculptors, Engravers, and Architects, from the Earliest Times to the Present, vol. III, Amsterdam, Gebroeders Diederichs, 1859, p. 629. - List of Artworks by Dutch Masters Still Alive, Which Were Admitted to the General Exhibition of 1810, exhibition catalog, Amsterdam, H. van Munster, 1810, p. 20. - WURZBACH, Alfred von, *Niederländisches Künstler-Lexikon*, compiled on the basis of archival research, vol. I (A–K), Vienna and Leipzig, Halm und Goldmann, 1906, p. 632.