Full-Length Portrait of Johan Maurits (1604-1679), Count of Nassau-Siegen

When this terracotta figure was made in 1727, Johan Maurits of Nassau-Siegen had been dead for almost 50 years. The sculptor shows him as governor of the Dutch colony in Brazil, the post he held from 1637 to 1644, and based the figure on a print in the book about those Brazilian years that the count had commissioned from the scholar Caspar Barlaeus, published in 1647.

At about 35 centimetres high, it was probably a model for a life-size statue, though no larger version is known. The pedestal carries the date and the letters IVL, joined together. The Mauritshuis gives the figure to Jan van Logteren of Amsterdam, although in 1727 Jan was 18 and still working in the shop of his father, Ignatius van Logteren, whose initials were the same, and some catalogues name both men. The art dealer Robert Noortman gave it to the museum in 2000.