Dear Saintluc
I am sorry you feel this way.

You have not seen this painting in person but only in photos and those that have seen it in person do not express the same opinion as you.

I appreciate all the research that went into your answer but i do not appreciate comments like those above.

I am sure you will be very happy if it is a copy but to me its a beautiful work and till such time as someone can proove they have the original my heart wil tell me otherwise.

After all this is done i will still have the painting and all you will have is an opinion.

If you call somebody an idiot an apologise 3 times does that make it okay.

Sour grapes i say!

Tennants had this to say:

´´Mr Allan Darwell, our painting specialist, has looked at the images and suggests that although the painting is certainly old (probably 1840-50) it is rather stiff in terms of its quality and Mr Darwell suggests it could possibly be a copy after John Francis Rigaud or Walter William Ouless´´.

Dear wasbach every time i take a picture of the whole painting it picks up a lot of glare from the varnish, i will try again.

The quote i erased from Tony Horne:

´´I have my doubts regarding the attribution as the style of painting differs. Where did you get the attribution from? I could be wrong as the painting is very dirty (discoloured varnish) and hiding a lot of detail which will only come out after the removal of the old varnish layers. I think it is definitely worth restoring as it has size and subject in its favour. Also it seems quite competently painted. It is definitely 19th. century and doubtfully a copy.´´

Regards

Tony Horne

If people (sorry i wont call them experts anymore because only Saintluc is an expert) continue to attribute this painting to 1840 and the original was painted at that time then:

I BELIEVE THIS IS THE ORIGINAL

Dear Saintluc,

what a wonderful idea to take screenshots! Thank you for this - please don´t get mad at me - very entertaining topic.

I had a strange feeling by this topic (and you answered the whole thing absolutely satisfying), that´s why I stayed out of this - although it is actually something for me.

What I still miss is a digipic of the whole painting, it seems to me that it is a smaller extract of the original.

Regards

Wasbach

A quote from a museum in Berlin

´´Dear Mr. Kyriakides,

meanwhile I figured out that the Stiftung Preußische Schlösser und Gärten Berlin-Brandenburg misses a painting of A. Hopfgarten ´´Schwäne fütternde Mädchen´´. I forwarded your e-mail to this museum.

Sincerely

Yours

Birgit Verwiebe

Dr. Birgit Verwiebe

Alte Nationalgalerie

Staatliche Museen zu Berlin

Bodestr. 1-3

10178 Berlin

Tel: 20905830

Fax: 20905802

If you believe that your piece is original , then why continue to seek other opinions, if your not willing to accept what they might say. If I was confident about an item, I wouldn´t try to that prove that to others. Good luck with your item.

I would just like to point out that Saintluc has more expertise than every regional auction picture ´specialist´ combined - a fact partly proven by Mr Darwell´s analysis. Whilst I don´t particularly want to dive into the middle of a mud throwing contest, this painting for me, does not have the quality to be by Hopfgarten´s hand. As already established, this image was immensly popular and copied in numerous other artworks. Just because we have been unable to track down another painted version does not by default make this the original. I would suggest contacting the Witt library, London for images of other versions.

---

Director, Pieta Fine Art Ltd

www.pietafineart.com

photo of painting taken in better lighting conditions

A reference here to a possible copy in Russia

http://forum.alexanderpalace.org/index.php?topic=11077.65;wap2 

843 Unknown Artist

Three women feeding swans

Size 0,37 x 0,38 Oil on canvas

What unit of measure is this?

High resolution picture:



http://browse.deviantart.com/?qh=§ion=&global=1&q=maidens+feeding+swans#/d4dt8jk 

quote:

---

Originally posted by paulkyriakides




Size 0,37 x 0,38 Oil on canvas



What unit of measure is this?

---

The unit must be meter:

´´the fundamental unit of length in the metric system, equivalent to 39.37 U.S. inches, originally intended to be, and being very nearly, equal to one ten-millionth of the distance from the equator to the pole measured on a meridian: defined from 1889 to 1960 as the distance between two lines on a platinum-iridium bar (the “International Prototype Meter”) preserved at the International Bureau of Weights and Measures near Paris; from 1960 to 1983 defined as 1,650,763.73 wavelengths of the orange-red radiation of krypton 86 under specified conditions; and now defined as 1/299,792,458 of the distance light travels in a vacuum in one second. Abbreviation: m´´



That makes sense also when taken the mentioned watercolors into account.



Regards,

Vietato



____________________

e-store: Vietato´s Gallery 


I am webmaster on this: Art Talk - Foredrag om kunst  (in Danish - about art lectures)

´´The fact that people who orginally doubted its authenticity are still following leads tells me something!´´


It tells you that we help people that post on the forum. Saintluc merely identified the source of the original image and is trying to track it down. If it wern´t for him, you wouldn´t be ´loving the suspense´. As for me, the gulf in quality between your painting and this painting by Hopfgarten is huge - the chiaroscuro, drapery, and moulding of the hands and face are in another league altogether.

http://iako.livejournal.com/244386.html 

Maybe Hopfgarten was having a bad day. If that´s the scenario, regrettably you will not be able to sell your painting. The gallery would place an embargo on it and may even try to seize it.

Fortunately though, it´s a copy, so you´ll be able to continue enjoying it.

---

Director, Pieta Fine Art Ltd

www.pietafineart.com

A painting that´s not in the Lost internet database and not in the ´´verlorene werke..´´ of Ms Bernhard? That´s turning clownish!

Bernhard, Marianne. Verlorene Werke der Malerei. In Deutschland in der Zeit von 1939 bis 1945 zerstörte und verschollene Gemälde. Beratende Mitarbeit von Kurt Martin. Hrsg. v. Klaus P. Rogner. Mchn., Ackermann, (1965). 4°. 232 SS. Katalog + Reg., 1 Bl. Impr. Mit 229 (225 ganzseit., davon 4 farb.) Tafelabb. OLwd. in Schuber m. Treppchen.

Titel + Schutzumschlag in Rot + Schwarz. – Mit den Berliner Verlusten (Märkisches Museum / Staatliche Museen-Gemäldegalerie / National-Galerie / Staatliche Schlösser + Gärten) als dominantem Block auf den SS. 10-77 nebst entsprechendem Bildteil...

http://www.lostart.de/Webs/EN/Datenbank/SucheSimpelErgebnis.html?param=SUCHE_ID%3D1655459 

Well! Isn´t our now ´´funny paul´´ speaking as if a grateful ambassador of Germany would hold feverishly the opened diplomatic pouch? I notice just now that paulkyriakides recently (oct 23) change his first post, where he said that he was going to throw away this painting when his wife stop him. He was right to study Art and right again by not owning this gallery any longer. Indeed, I begin to understand the specimen who hates to be catched out and will fly in the face of facts. It must be cool to work with. He wrote somewhere that the property he bought and found this painting in belonged in the past to a skilful lawyer. So, except the vanishing of the ´´aw´´, nothing has changed.

Quote from: Alexandra Bauer

´´Dear Mr. Kyriakides,

As curator responsable for German, Dutch and Flemish Paintings, I received your mail of October 11 concerning the Hopfgarten-painting.
Our Hopfgarten painting ´´maidens feeding swans´´ is indeed a war loss since 1945.

May I ask you tell me the dimensions of the painting? ........

With best regards,



Alexandra Bauer

DONT YOU LOVE THE SUSPENSE?

Saintluc i already checked that link when i received the email from Dr.Birgit Verwiebe from Alte Nationalgalerie but who am i to argue with curator Alexandra Bauer from spsg.

The fact that people who orginally doubted its authenticity are still following leads tells me something!

No i wont say it out loud again for fear of retribution but you know what i am thinking.

Also thank you for posting on this thread again its not my intention to piss people off.

I am no expert but i have owned a gallery and studied art.

´´Life is not perfect and neither is the internet if it were there would be no questions left to ask and no mysteries to seak, this is what makes life so interesting. ´´ Paul Kyriakides 2011