Description: Black chalk, brown wash, 197 x 155 mm. Ruled framing lines in brown ink. Laid down. Numbered on the mount in the lower right corner, in pen and brown ink, 1941 (Sparre), changed from 142 (Tessin).

There is some doubt as to whether Tessin’s entry (no. 142) really refers to this drawing. It reads: “Un paysan dans sa cabanne. Al’encre de la Chine”. Neither the subject nor the technique is precisely described. The subject matter is elusive. In the Stockholm exhibition of 1953, the drawing was titled The Stone Cutter, while Schulz prefers a more generic title and talks about a possible baking oven. However, it seems as if the object in front of the man is a grindstone, with a pot suspended above it from which water drips down, running off into a bucket on the ground. In all likelihood the man is holding a knife.

Schulz lists another version in Leiden (cat. no. 1064), and he considers one of them a replica. The Leiden drawing is without doubt the better one. In part, the Stockholm version reproduces the drawing stroke by stroke, but some areas are simplified. The brushwork is more schematic but also less distinct: see for example the shaded area in the foreground. Some points seem to have been misunderstood, such as the hand holding the knife and the man’s chin. 

The Leiden drawing comes from the collection of Jacob de Vos (1735–1831) or his heirs by the same name, and it is well known that the members of that family made copies, perhaps even with the intention to deceive. However, they cannot be responsible for our drawing, since it was already in Tessin’s collection around 1740. [Magnusson, Dutch Drawings no. 397]

Knivslipare