The Prophet Elijah and the Widow of Zarephath

c. 1630

Cornelis van Poelenburch

Painter, Dutch, 1594/1595 - 1667

In a landscape with ruins overgrown with plants, a bearded, old man greets a kneeling young woman and boy near the lower right corner in this horizontal painting. At least seven people move through the landscape beyond, and everyone has light skin and is barefoot. In the trio to the lower right, the man stands facing our right in profile. He has a steel-gray beard and hair, a prominent nose, and his mouth is closed. He wears a thistle-purple tunic under a scarlet-red cloak. He looks down at the woman, and he holds out his right hand, closer to us, toward her. In front of him, to our right, the woman kneels facing our left with her arms spread, as she looks toward the man’s extended hand. She wears a sapphire-blue dress with white sleeves, and honey-brown fabric wraps over one shoulder and around her waist. The boy next to her holds a bundle of sticks with both arms. He has dark hair and wears a brown robe over a plum-purple tunic. The landscape around them has some scrubby green growth along the dirt ground. One column holding up a crumbling entablature rises near us, up along the left edge of the composition. Plants grow over more ruins to our right, which are nestled against a rocky hill a short distance away. In the field between the ruins, a woman wearing a rose-pink robe carries a bundle balanced on her head while other men, wearing coral red, topaz blue, or golden yellow walk, through the landscape. In the distance, there are green hills, slate-blue mountains, and more ruins. The sky is pale yellow near the horizon and changes to lapis blue above, with light gray and white clouds.

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Cornelis van Poelenburch was an important representative of the first generation of Dutch artists who drew inspiration from the landscape and culture of Italy. He is celebrated for his small-scale paintings of arcadian, biblical, or mythological subjects that featured figures in an Italianate landscape, often with Roman ruins. This work was painted in Utrecht, after the artist had spent nearly a decade in Italy, and although the landscape setting here is imaginary, the ruin on the left is based on the Temple of Castor and Pollux in the Roman Forum, built in 495 BC.

The Prophet Elijah and the Widow of Zarephath illustrates the biblical story of the encounter between prophet Elijah and a widow and her son gathering sticks when he arrives at the town of Zarephath. Elijah asks her for a piece of bread, and the destitute widow invites him to her home where she uses her last bit of flour and oil to bake for him. The prophet then blesses the woman and her child, and assures them that their supplies of flour and oil will never be diminished. Shortly thereafter the son dies, but because of Elijah’s fervent prayers, God returned the boy to life. The story was often interpreted as an Old Testament prefiguration of the passion and sacrifice of Christ. The son, who clutches a bundle of firewood, pre-shadowed Christ carrying the cross, and because he was later brought back from the dead, he was seen as a prefiguration of the resurrected Christ.

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Artwork overview

More About this Artwork

Scholarly Article:  Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth Century: The Prophet Elijah and the Widow of Zarephath, c. 1630

This horizontal painting shows a group of eight light-skinned musicians and onlookers gathered closely around a rectangular, carpet-covered table. The front edge of the table runs parallel to the bottom edge of the painting, and seems close to us. Shown from about the waist up, the men and women’s vivid lapis-blue, coral-red, buttercup-yellow, lilac-purple, and moss-green garments fall in crisp folds. Bright reflections on the fabric suggest a satin-like material. Two women wear feathers in their hair and one man’s hat is plumed. One man, wearing crimson red and black, sits with his back to us to our left on the near side of the table. He holds the neck of a bass viol, about the size of a cello, with his left hand, and points to pages of an open music book with the bow in his right hand. The other people cluster on the far side of the table. A man to the left plays a violin; a woman at the center plays a guitar-sized bandora, and a woman to our right plays a lute. The musicians, along with a man who leans over the table from between the two women, look down at the music books. A young man behind the woman at the center holds up a glass of pale liquid with his right hand as he touches his left forefinger to his smiling lips. A man and woman stand close together in the background to our right, in the top right corner of the canvas.

Scholarly Series:  Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth Century

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Cottin collection; (his sale, by Pierre Remy and Sieur Helle, Paris, 27 November-22 December 1752, 1st day, no. 382);[1] purchased by Le Brun. (sale, Sotheby's, London, 21 February 1962, no. 66); (Thos. Agnew and Sons, Ltd., London); sold 29 May 1963 to Joseph F. McCrindle [1923-2008], New York;[2] gift 2004 to NGA.
[1] The painting was sold as a pendant to Poelenburch’s “Abraham conduissant son Fil Isaac au lieu du Sacrifice, 12 pounces de haut sur 15 1/2 de large.” On the verso of the panel are some unidentified wax seals.
[2] Also on the verso is an Agnew’s label with the number 24022 stenciled on it. Venetia Harlow, Agnew’s archivist, confirmed in an e-mail of 21 December 2009 to Arthur K. Wheelock, Jr. (in NGA curatorial files) that this label number corresponded to Agnew’s stock number 3792, and provided the details of their acquisition and sale of the painting.

Associated Names

Bibliography

2006

  • Vogelaar, Christiaan, and Gregor J. M. Weber, eds. Rembrandt's Landscapes. Exh. cat. Staatliche Museen Kassel, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister, Kassel; Stedelijk Museum De Lakenhal, Leiden. Leiden, 2006: 122–123, fig. 103.

2012

  • Grasselli, Margaret M., and Arthur K. Wheelock, Jr., eds. The McCrindle Gift: A Distinguished Collection of Drawings and Watercolors. Exh. cat. National Gallery of Art. Washington, 2012: x (detail), 19, repro. 185.

Wikidata ID

Q20177108

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