In addition to being one of the most well-documented paintings by Rembrandt in existence, this work also boasts an impeccable provenance, nearly unbroken from the year after its execution to the present day. Traceable to a transaction in Amsterdam in 1647 between Martin van den Broeck and Andries Ackersloot, the picture has passed through the collections of a number of notable figures including: Rembrandt’s former pupil Ferdinand Bol; 17th century merchant and Amsterdam mayor Jan Six; and with the American expatriate painter Benjamin West. After passing through several other hands, including the important collection of Sir Thomas Baring in the mid-19th century, the work entered the celebrated Pannwitz Collection in Heemstede, later to be folded into the Aurora Trust – where it had remained with the Pannwitz family for at least 90 years. The painting has remained in the same collection since it was last sold privately in 2006.

The work has been publicly exhibited only a handful of times over the years, recently appearing in Rembrandt’s Journey: Painter, Draftsman, Etcher at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston & The Art Institute of Chicago in 2004, at the Gemäldegalerie in Berlin in 2006, and most recently as the subject of the Divine Encounter: Rembrandt’s Abraham and the Angels at the Frick Museum in New York City in 2017.

The auction will be preceded by a series of previews in Hong Kong, Los Angeles, Amsterdam and London, before returning to New York for our Masters Week exhibition in January. In addition to Rembrandt's Abraham and the Angels, the January sale series will be headlined by Sandro Botticelli's 15th-century portrait of a Young Man Holding a Roundel, estimated in excess of $80 million (separate release available here).