Paired portraits of spouses Martin and Salmanca Open Coppit were purchased by state museums chipped. Private transaction helped organize Christie's

February 1, 2016 was made the first deal for the joint acquisition of two masterpieces of Rembrandt by the governments of France and the Netherlands. We are talking about the portraits of the spouses Open Coppit and Martin Almanza Rembrandt, which agreed to acquire jointly of the Louvre and Amsterdam's Rijksmuseum. Earlier it was reported that the portraits are estimated at a total of €160 million Transaction was brokered by auction house Christie's.

Originally the Netherlands were ready to purchase both portraits. The government was ready to allocate €80 million and the remaining €80 million was going to pay the Amsterdam Rijksmuseum. However, with the response the proposal was made by the French government: Minister of culture Fleur Pellerin (Fleur Pellerin) reported that the state Bank of France is ready to allocate €80 million to purchase half of the rights to the portraits. France has the same right to consider these portraits as its national treasure, like the Netherlands, because these two portraits by Rembrandt never left France since 1877, when they were bought by Baron Gustave de Rothschild. Sell them decided Baron Eric de Rothschild.

the Portraits of Martin and his wife Almansa Open Coppit made by the artist in 1634, the year after the wedding couple. Earlier it was announced that the state came to the decision that portraits must always be exhibited together — alternately in the Louvre (Paris) and the State Museum of the Netherlands (Amsterdam), but being they are in separate possession according to French law. In a few weeks, both portraits will be exhibited in Louvre for the first time in 60 years. Buy paintings, done by two different States for the exhibition in public museums brokered by Christie's, is the first of its kind. The portraits were in the collection of the Rothschild family since 1878, last exhibited in 1956 in the Netherlands that allows us to speak of them as the least studied the masterpieces in the entire legacy of Rembrandt.

Here's how to describe these portraits in 1897 by German art historian Wilhelm von Bode: "Dapper dressed young husband with a sleek, similar to a female face, which gradually moves towards the viewer with the glove in his hand, is a shining example of a successful courtier, half-dandy, half-adventurer [...] the Wife, on the contrary [...] represents nobility and dignity, rare in the paintings of artists. Graceful stand stock-still, she looks at the viewer with caution."

Rembrandt painted a portrait of Martin Almanza and Open Coppet in 1634 when he was 28 years old. At this age he was already the most popular portrait painter of Amsterdam. Born into a wealthy Calvinist family who had moved to Amsterdam from Antwerp, Maarten Salmans (1613-1641) became acquainted with Rembrandt in Leiden, where he studied in the years of 1628-1633 (probably unsuccessfully, since there is no written evidence of the receipt Salmanson diploma). The names of Rembrandt and Salmanca occur in dated 24 March 1631 the document found in the archives of the Leiden lawyer Charles Otterman, who himself was the happy owner of Rembrandt's paintings. In 1633 Salmans married Open Coppit (1611-1689), an orphan, came from a noble surname of Amsterdam, among which also were patrons of the young Rembrandt. Marriage to Coppet was an undoubted success for Salmanca, because in addition to the noble origin of his new wife he also got her unheard of in those days a dowry of 35 thousand guilders. This is the dowry allowed the newlyweds to enjoy the Rembrandt portraits, which are estimated to cost about 500 guilders each. The birth of the couple first child in 1633 was a good opportunity to order another Rembrandt painting, which was the work entitled "the Holy family", located currently in the collection of the Alte Pinakothek Munich.

the Material was prepared by Maria Onuchin, AI

Source: press-релиз Christie's, artinvestment.ru