Art dealer Oudt-Holland

In September 2024, Charlotte Wolters and Sophie Manintveld, under the supervision of RKD curator Ellis Dullaart, began research on the albumsFootnote1  – later joined by Sascha Ladenius and Jolijn Wilgehof. They verified the attributions and provenance of the artworks recorded in the albums and searched for additional information. By now, more than half of the works have been investigated and entered into RKDimages.Footnote2  This research has not only yielded information about individual artworks, but also many new insights into the activities and network of Kunstzaal Oudt-Holland and into the person of Aad Boer himself.

Aad Boer

Adrianus Johannes Boer was born on 7 September 1904 in The Hague, the son of a tailor. He grew up in a family of four children. Boer initially worked as a waiter, but by his thirtieth year he had begun dealing in art objects. This may have been influenced by his older brother Johan and his brother-in-law Joannes van Heeswijk, both active as antique dealers. In 1927, Aad Boer married Eefje Jongervaard, a marriage that ended in divorce after just four years. In 1934, Boer married for the second time, to Elisabeth Witteveen. That same year their daughter Adriana was born, followed four years later by their son Mathijs. The first reference to Kunstzaal Oudt-Holland appears in 1939, then located at Piet Heinstraat 64a in The Hague.Footnote3  From 1942, the gallery was located at Anna Paulownastraat 11.Footnote4  Boer died suddenly on 16 December 1955 at the age of 51.Footnote5  Until 1957 Kunstzaal Oudt-Holland remained a member of the Royal Association of Art Dealers in the Netherlands.Footnote6  Thereafter the business appears to have been dissolved.

Farces and Dramas

In 1943, under the pseudonym Inge Wijde, Boer published the book Farces and Dramas in the Art Trade. It is a collection of anecdotes in which the author, with irony and humor, describes common practices in the art trade – probably drawn largely from reality. Boer emphasizes abuses, the production and trade of forgeries, and the gullibility of buyers. The book combines personal observations with more caricatural scenes, offering a fascinating glimpse into the art market of his time. Later the book appeared in a second (1944) and third edition (1946). The introduction to the second edition makes clear that Boer had written the book during a 'forced rest cure' and that he had been unable to add as many illustrations to the first edition as he had intended – something he corrected in the second.Footnote7  The introduction elaborates on why he published under a pseudonym: ‘because I was advertising neither for a painter nor for an art dealer; this could easily have been done, but it was not my intention.’ Footnote8 The book’s contents certainly did not cast the art trade in a favorable light. Boer deliberately makes the art buyer aware of the at      times unreliable practices of art dealers. He describes how many low-quality paintings were intentionally sold under the name of a great master to unsuspecting buyers. A striking detail: Boer himself seems to have been guilty of such practices, as we shall see later.

Although Farces and Dramas contains no literal references to Kunstzaal Oudt-Holland or to Boer’s own life, many parallels emerge between the lines. One example features a wine merchant ‘Joh. Bijdehand’, who bought a painting and resold it the same evening to his brother-in-law at a much higher price. This inspired the seller to become an art dealer: ‘With this fortunate transaction the first stone was laid. J.B. goes into paintings’.Footnote9  Could this be Boer himself, with his background as a waiter? Might the initials J.B. refer to his own name or to that of his brother Johannes? Boer’s own brother-in-law was an antique dealer, making him a plausible candidate for the buyer in this story.

Another anecdote concerns a collector known for ‘polishing and cleaning’ his paintings. The author sold him a painting in the manner of Melchior d’Hondecoeter (1635–1695), and ‘cautioned him in particular to leave the work untouched’.Footnote10  Research into the photo albums revealed that the painting was indeed handled by Kunstzaal Oudt-Holland in 1941, then still in good condition. Yet, as can be seen in the illustrations in Farces and Dramas, Boer’s warning went unheeded, and the painting became severely damaged.

That Boer was aware of the practices of the German occupiers in the art world during the Second World War becomes clear in the third edition of Farces and Dramas, published in 1946, where he writes that he could ‘finally write what he wanted to write’.Footnote11  He states that he opposed collaboration with the occupiers and that the Germans, in addition to many valuable paintings, ‘also bought a bunch of bunglers’ – in all likelihood with the help of Dutch art dealers.Footnote12

Trading Activities

Kunstzaal Oudt-Holland sold paintings from the seventeenth through the twentieth centuries. The gallery mainly specialized in the sale of Old Masters, as can be seen in the titles of exhibitions and newspaper reviews from the time.Footnote13  These articles particularly highlighted seventeenth-century paintings – largely by 'minor' masters – and nineteenth-century works of the Hague School. The latter received positive reviews, but opinions on the seventeenth-century paintings at Oudt-Holland were divided. In 1953 the Haagsch Dagblad wrote that some works by 'second- and third-rate artists' were interesting, but 'the majority is nevertheless a rather dull and impersonal repetition of what greater artists of that time produced'. Footnote14 The Algemeen Dagblad, however, probably writing about the same exhibition, noted that 'less important but nonetheless art-historically remarkable figures are represented by qualitatively good works.”Footnote15

The quality of the artworks traded at Oudt-Holland was mixed, particularly the Old Masters. The attributions noted in the photo albums have often proved incorrect. Moreover, research revealed that a number of paintings which at first glance appeared seventeenth-century, or had previously been sold as such, were actually from a later period. One example is a landscape from album 3, attributed to “Hackaert?”.Footnote16   The painting shows an Italianate landscape with two strolling figures. Further research quickly dismissed the attribution to Jan Hackaert (1628–after 1685). Stylistic characteristics suggest it is more likely an eighteenth-century work.

Not only works of this kind, based on examples by seventeenth-century masters, were sold at Oudt-Holland; a substantial number of the Old Masters in the photo albums are now recognized as copies, or carry a false signature. For example, the painting Christ and the Samaritan Woman, which carried the monogram 'A.v.W.' in the lower left and was attributed to Adriaen van der Werff (1659–1722). The monogram is false, and the work is a copy after a painting Adriaen completed in 1702 together with his brother Pieter van der Werff (1665–1722). A comparison makes the difference clear: in the original the Samaritan woman’s face is finely detailed and her gaze soft and open; in the copy her face is flatter, and she appears to look past Christ.

That Boer sold such works by followers and copyists as authentic seventeenth-century paintings is not what one would expect after reading Farces and Dramas. He describes, for example, two days in the life of an art dealer, repeatedly confronted with forgeries being offered to him. Although he was clearly alert to such practices, our research shows that he himself also dealt in copies and paintings with false signatures.

In addition to the seventeenth- and eighteenth-century art described above, the photo albums reveal that Boer also dealt extensively in nineteenth- and twentieth-century paintings. Here the focus was especially on the Hague School and other artists active in and around The Hague, such as Jan Hendrik Weissenbruch (1824-1903), Floris Arntzenius (1864-1925), Willem de Zwart (1862-1931) and George Hendrik Breitner (1857-1923). The works in this category consistently proved to be of higher quality than those from earlier centuries. Album 6, for example, contains a very fine early figure study by Breitner. The dark skin of the model, shown in profile, contrasts powerfully with the light background. The painting shows the expressiveness characteristic of Breitner’s style.

Kunstzaal Oudt-Holland during the Second World War

Notes in the photo albums and the results of our research reveal that Boer maintained a broad network, with contacts both in The Netherlands and abroad. Strikingly, his name appears in Adriaan Venema’s book Kunsthandel in Nederland 1940-1945 (Art Trade in the Netherlands 1940–1945) only in relation to the publication of Farces and Dramas.Footnote17  He is not linked to individuals active in the art market on behalf of the German occupiers. And although in Farces and Dramas, Boer presents himself as a critical observer in a world full of forgeries and deceit, both the archival material and his wartime business practices paint a more complex picture. Boer himself recalls in Farces and Dramas that in 1944 he and several other dealers were forced by the Germans to become advisory members of the art trade committee, part of the Nazi-established Kultuurkamer.Footnote18

It also emerges that Boer regularly had contact with and sold paintings to prominent Germans, including Hans Posse (1879–1942), head of the Sonderauftrag Linz, and – via Alois Miedl (1903–1970) – Hermann Göring (1893–1946).Footnote19  According to his travel diaries, Hans Posse visited Kunstzaal Oudt-Holland on 23 April 1941, accompanied by The Hague art dealer D. Sijperda.Footnote20   Posse eventually purchased a number of works at Oudt-Holland for the planned Führermuseum, including Company Making Music by Gerbrandt van den Eeckhout (1621–1674). Today this painting is part of the NK Collection, managed by the Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands, and on long-term loan to the Kunstmuseum Den Haag.Footnote21

Another interesting case is the painting Girl Picking Fruit from a Small Potted Tree, pictured in one of the Oudt-Holland albums. This piece appears in the inventory lists of Göring’s collection as by Jan Mijtens (1614–1670).Footnote22  The archive of art dealership Goudstikker/Miedl, housed at the RKD, records that the painting was purchased on 10 January 1940 from W. Rosenthal in Amsterdam.Footnote23  On 31 January of the following year it was sold to Göring, as confirmed by the 'RM-Verzeichnis' of his collection.Footnote24  A few months later the painting returned to Goudstikker/Miedl as part of the so-called 'Vermeer Exchange', in which Göring traded about 140 previously acquired paintings for Christ and the Adulterous Woman , then believed to be by Johannes Vermeer (1632–1675) but later exposed as a forgery by Han van Meegeren (1889–1947).Footnote25  Exactly when Boer handled Girl Picking Fruit from a Small Potted Tree is unclear. A photograph of the work is in album 5, along with other paintings in Boer’s possession between 1940 and 1942. He may have acquired it after the 'Vermeer Exchange' in 1941, perhaps directly from Goudstikker/Miedl? It is also possible he purchased it at an Amsterdam auction in 1953, but given the contents of album 5 and his preference for nineteenth-century art at that time, the latter seems unlikely.

Boer’s network included various well-known figures. He often did business with the Hague gallery Galerie Internationale and with art and tapestry dealer J. Gans, also based in The Hague. He was frequently in contact with connoisseurs such as Willem Vogelsang (1875-1954), Cornelis Hofstede de Groot (1863-1930) and Max J. Friedländer (1867-1958). Notes in the photo albums show that they regularly provided attributions for Boer’s paintings. Boer writes in Farces and Dramas: 'People ask for names, and are not satisfied with some obscure nobody'.Footnote26

Conclusion

Boer’s business practices and network, as revealed by our research, illustrate the complex intertwining of idealism, opportunism, and survival instinct that characterized the Dutch art trade during the Second World War. His critical tone in Farces and Dramas often contrasts with his own actions, yet at the same time reflects the tensions under which many dealers then operated – balancing ethics, economic necessity, and external pressure. Boer’s activities also demonstrate how, in this period, the art trade became enmeshed with the power structures and collecting practices of the Nazi regime.