Tako Hajo Jelgersma (Harlingen 1702 – 1795 Haarlem)

Allegorical Representation on the Mysteries of Nature

Pen and brown ink, grey wash, brown ink framing lines, 81 x 102 mm (3.2 x 4 inch)

Signed with monogram and dated ‘THJ [in ligature]: inv: 1747’ (pen and brown ink, lower right)

Annotated, presumably by the artist, ‘de bespiegeling door met behulp / der ondervinding de verborgentheden / der natuur ontdekkende’ (pen and brown ink, verso)¹

Inscribed ‘Pv60’ (encircled, red pencil, verso) and ‘f[?]467’ (pencil, verso)

Provenance
Private collection, the Netherlands

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Jelgersma was born in Harlingen and received his initial artistic education from the marine painter Wigerus Vitringa (1657–1725) and then from Frans Decker (1684–1751) in Haarlem.² Jelgersma established his studio in Haarlem, where he joined the painter’s guild of St Luke in 1752. He is known for his grisaille large-scale decorative paintings but mainly for his portraits in oils, watercolour and pastels, the latter showing the influence of Cornelis Troost.³ Jelgersma became rather fashionable with the Haarlem elite around the middle of the century, and for instance painted the portrait of Pieter Teyler van der Hulst, the founder of Teylers Museum, where it still hangs.

The present charming drawing is exceptional in the artist’s oeuvre. Such allegorical depictions were known as ‘zinnebeelden’, in this case representing the mysteries of Nature, represented as a sculpture of Diana of Ephesus, also known as the ‘Beautiful Artemis’, flanked by representations of Bespiegeling (Contemplation) and Ondervinding (Experience), who jointly unveil the sculpture, thereby unveiling Nature’s mysteries – the explanatory inscription on the verso of the drawing is presumably by Jelgersma himself, illuminating the meaning of the mysterious subject. Jelgersma’s intellect and knowledge of the classics is furthermore illustrated by his design for the title page of the topographical atlas of Elisabeth Wolff of 1766, preserved in the Fries Museum in Leeuwarden (fig.)⁴ and by a series of no less than 51 drawings illustrating Homer’s Odyssy, preserved in the British Museum in London.⁵

1. ‘Contemplation discovering the mysteries of nature with the help of experience’.
2. For the artist, see R.J.A. te Rijdt, ‘Tako Hajo Jelgersma (1702-1795) en Betje Wolff: het titelblad voor haar topografische atlas en een portret’, Delineavit et Sculpsit no. 25 (September 2002), pp. 26-36.
3. Neil Jeffares, Dictionary of pastellists before 1800, online database www.pastellists.com.
4. Pen and wash in grey, 293 x 188 mm, inv. no. II 535; Te Rijdt, op. cit.
5. Each 247 x 319 mm, mounted in an album, inv. no. 1885,0509.1900 and further inv. numbers.