BY ALBERT CHEN

Jacob Jordaens’s portrait of his wife, Catharina van Noort, sold for €154,200 at Bonhams in Paris on 4 November 2026. Offered in From Antwerp to Bruges: The Collection of a Flemish Connoisseur, the intimate painting was one of the leading results in a collection sale totaling €700,100. The price includes buyer’s premium.

An Intimate Portrait with an Exhibition History

Catharina appears in a red garment beneath generous folds of pale fabric, her softly illuminated face turned against a dark background. The picture’s appeal lies in the closeness of the observation rather than elaborate surroundings: the light catches the sitter’s cheeks and collar while the setting recedes. According to Bonhams, the portrait was exhibited at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam in 1936 and the Royal Museum of Fine Arts in Antwerp in 1978, giving it an exhibition history extending well beyond the auction room.

The Family Connection Behind the Painting

Catharina was the daughter of Adam van Noort, the Antwerp painter who trained Jordaens. The couple married in 1616, linking the young artist’s professional and family lives. Catharina was also a recurring presence in his art: the National Gallery in Athens identifies her as a favored model. Her portrait thus offers more than the likeness of an unidentified sitter; its subject belongs directly to the painter’s personal world.

Jordaens, who lived from 1593 to 1678, became one of the leading figures of Flemish painting after the deaths of Rubens and Van Dyck. The National Gallery in London records commissions connected with Queen Christina of Sweden, the House of Orange and Amsterdam’s town hall. His career encompassed major decorative and religious projects, making the scale and personal subject of this portrait a quieter counterpart to that public success.

The €154,200 sale gives a specific measure of demand for this picture, rather than evidence that every Jordaens portrait or Old Master painting is rising in value. Here, the combination of a named family sitter, established exhibition history and the painter’s standing supplied the story behind a substantial six-figure result.

Sources: Bonhams; National Gallery, London; National Gallery, Athens

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