Winter Landscape – Dutch School, C. 1700, Follower Of Nicolaes Berchem

Oil on canvas. Dutch school, c. 1700, follower of Nicolaes Berchem.
From the end of the 13th century until the middle of the 19th century, Europe experienced a Little Ice Age characterized by very low temperatures such as it had not experienced since the Great Ice Age that occurred 10,000 years earlier. In 1564, an Antwerp chronicler testified that ten consecutive weeks of frost allowed the people of Antwerp to cross the Scheldt on foot and set up a fair there for a few weeks where food and drink were served. If winter is rich in leisure activities and comical anecdotes suitable for nourishing Dutch genre painting, this season also brings atmospheric and luminous effects such as those represented in our work. Favoring a realistic vision of the landscape in vogue in the second half of the 17th century, our painter adopted a naturalistic style characterized by a low horizon line along which figures unfold. Busy with their daily work, some figures seem to be captured in the act of labor, while others chat after returning from fishing, and some take a break while smoking a pipe. This everyday scene is enveloped by a cloudy sky from which emerge the rays of a low winter sun, imprinting shadows and colors on the whole. This style is similar to the Italianate landscape school represented by artists who, inspired by the Arcadian art of Nicolas Poussin and Claude Gellée, assimilated the full variety of light effects on objects. However, most of them only very rarely painted winter. Among these Italianate painters who were sometimes inspired by this season, we can cite Nicolaes Berchem who painted a painting (formerly in the Lionel Nathan de Rotschild collection) showing a composition similar to ours, bordered by a brown-ocher building from which a bridge crosses a frozen stream on which groups of figures are busy. However, the manner of our painter and the clothing of his figures place us more likely around 1700, among Berchem's followers.

We have chosen to present this lively landscape in a Roman frame in molded, gilded and yellowed wood from the 17th century of the Carlo Maratta type.
Dimensions: 48 x 60.5 cm – 59 x 71 cm with the frame

Biography: Nicolaes Berchem (Haarlem, October 1, 1620 – Amsterdam, February 18, 1683) began his apprenticeship with his father, a still life painter. According to Houbraken, he continued his studies with Jan van Goyen and Claes Moeyaert before becoming a master at the Guild of Saint Luke in Haarlem in 1642. Although we are not sure whether he traveled to Italy, Nicolaes Berchem developed a very Italianate style from the 1650s onwards, becoming the leader of the second generation of Dutch Italianate painters. Having produced some 850 paintings, Berchem enjoyed considerable success, which was reflected in the high price of his works compared to those of his peers. Thus, while the average price of a painting by Jacob van Ruysdael was 28 florins during the last third of the 17th century, it was 91 florins for a landscape by Berchem. To meet demand, he surrounded himself with numerous apprentices, among whom Karel Dujardin stands out as the most talented follower.

Bibliography:
- HARWOOD, Laurie B., BROWN, Christopher, Inspired by Italy: Dutch Landscape Painting 1600-1700, London, Dulwich Picture Gallery, 2002.
- SUCHTELEN (van), Ariane (dir.), Holland Frozen in Time: The Dutch Winter Landscape in the Golden Age, Zwolle, Waanders, 2001.
- SUTTON, Peter C., Masters of 17th Century Dutch Landscape Painting, (exp. cat. Boston Museum of fine arts, 1987), Boston Museum of Fine Arts Publishing, 1987.