G.H. Breitner girl in kimino
This week I read in the newspaper that one of the kimono girls of the Dutch painter G.H. Breitner is for sale. It is the top piece of an auction of 19th century paintings by Glerum Auctioneers in Amsterdam. The value of the painting is estimated at € 80000 - € 120000. It is a beautiful painting and shows a girl in a red kimono sitting in front of a mirror attaching an earring to her ear. Without doubt the girl on the painting is Geesje Kwak, a regular model of Breitner. In the last decade of the nineteenth century Breitner painted a series of kimino paintings. For most of these paintings he used the Amsterdam girl Geesje Kwak as a model. Breitner was also a good photographer and often used photos as studies for his paintings. He made many photographs of Geesje Kwak with or without kimono. So it is easy tot establish the identity of the girl on the painting. On at least one other painting of the kimono series he also used the earring and the mirror as a theme. This particular kimono girl rather unknown because it was acquired in an early stage by one of Breitner's pupils and for years in the private collection of his family. Today the painting was sold for € 360.000 , three times as much as the estimated value.