Landscape with a Rider in Red
Artist/Maker
Material / Technique
Dimensionsh x w: Mått 85 x 110,4 cm
Inventory numberNM 1183
Other titlesTitle (sv): Landskap med rödklädd ryttare Title (en): Landscape with a Rider in Red Title (en): Forest Landscape with a Rider in Red
DescriptionCatalogue raisonné: Description in Flemish paintings C. 1600-C. 1800 III, Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, 2010, cat.no. 2: Technical notes: The painting’s support is a single piece of densely woven, coarse, plain weave fabric. The original fabric has been lined and mounted on a nonoriginal strainer, with the tacking edges trimmed to the edges of the present strainer. Cusping patterns on three sides (except the top) indicate that the painting has retained approximately its original dimensions. The preparatory layers consist of a lower white layer followed by an opaque, buff-coloured imprimatura, slightly uneven in its application. The overlying paint layers completely cover the imprimatura except for the area of the pond or lake where it remains visible through the semi-transparent layer of blue. Paint is applied thickly, in mostly opaque layers, with vigorous brush marking in the landscape, especially in the foreground road, trees and foliage, and with strong impastos in the white clouds, in the yellow and white highlights on the foliage, tree trunks and foreground rocks. The blue sky was filled in after the large tree in the foreground had been painted, and the foliage along the outer contour was then added over the blue. All the figures in the foreground, including the rider, were added after the landscape had already been painted. A discoloured layer of old varnish is present. Retouching along the left and bottom edges covers abrasion and slight losses. Coarse retouching is visible in the sky and clouds; scattered retouches occur in the foliage of the trees, with some repainting of the foliage in the large central tree. The painting underwent conservation treatment in 1931, 1935 and 1982. Provenance: Karl XIII, Rosersberg; Karl XV, Rosersberg, 1818–1872; (his estate sale, Ulriksdal, Henryk Bukowski, 16–24 May 1873, no. 774); purchased in 1873. exhibited: Stockholm, 1933, no. 1; Stockholm, 1977, no. 61. Bibliography: Suppl. to NM Cat. 1873, p. 86; Upmark 1882, p. 91; Göthe 1887, p. 7 (the figures possibly by A. F. van der Meulen); Göthe 1893, p. 11; Thiéry 1953, p. 171; NM Cat. 1958, p. 4; Cavalli-Björkman in NM Yearbook 1978, no. 25, p. 41; Thiéry and Kervyn de Meerendré 1987, pp. 135–136, 233 no. 130, p. 137; NM Cat. 1990, p. 5. In the foreground of a wooded landscape, a gentleman wearing a bright red coat rides along a sandy road leading out of the forest, accompanied by two men on foot. A patch of sunlight illuminates the group of three travellers. A peasant woman rounds a bend in the path a little further on, as she walks towards an inn nestled amidst the trees. The dense woods of the left half of the composition – dominated by a tall old tree at centre spreading its luxuriant foliage – give way on the right to a more open, atmospheric view of a pond and rolling tree-lined hills stretching into the far distance. The composition and execution of the landscape in this large, signed, painting are entirely characteristic of the work of the landscapist Jacques d’Arthois, a leading exponent of the Brussels school of decorative landscape painting in the second half of the 17th century. D’Arthois’ woodland and forest scenes were undoubtedly inspired by the topography of the Forest of Soignes, a vast area located to the south and east of Brussels. In 1655, at the height of his career, the artist purchased a house at Boisfort, in the heart of the forest. Frequented by local landscape painters in the 17th century, beginning with Denys van Alsloot and Lodewijk de Vadder, among whose followers D’Arthois was a leading spirit (although not a pupil of De Vadder but of Jan Mertens), the dense woods near Soignes, generously interspersed with open heath and numerous small ponds and streams, was a constant source of inspiration for their landscapes. Although large areas remained relatively wild and unpopulated throughout the 17th century, the forest encompassed the ducal castle of Tervueren, as well as other country estates, small hamlets and several convents and monasteries. The sites depict- ed in several of D’Arthois’ landscapes have been identified by the detailed rendering of a distant church or town, but the exact locale of the present painting cannot be precisely identified and – though loosely based on the topography of the Forest of Soignes – is probably imaginary. Unlike earlier Netherlandish painters of forest scenery such as Van Alsloot or Gillis van Coninxloo II, D’Arthois specialized in views at the edge of the forest rather than the interior, areas characterized by sunken roadways, sand pits, ponds or small streams. This allowed for a juxtaposition of shaded bosky woods on one side of the composition, with an airy vista of water and open land opposite, a frequent arrangement seen already in his earliest surviving dated landscape, the Wooded Landscape with a River of 1640 in Bruges (Groeningemuseum).1 It also enabled the artist to include a greater variety of tree forms and other vegetation native to the area. D’Arthois’ picturesque landscape compositions essentially follow the local Brussels tradition of decorative landscape painting, as practised by artist such as Van Alsloot and De Vadder. In general, however, his landscapes are more densely wooded and less open than those of De Vadder. The central motifs in paintings by D’Arthois are tall trees spreading their lush foliage. After about 1650/1655, according to Thiéry and Kervyn de Meerendré (1987), the artist accords ever greater importance to the purely decorative effect created by large forest-growing plants depicted in the foreground of his landscapes. In the present painting the disproportionately large white stock (Verbascum thapsus) and plantains that grow in the centre foreground dwarf even the horse and rider moving along the road. Compositionally, the picture is closely related to a landscape attributed to D’Arthois in the collections of the Earl of Wemyss at Gosford House, East Lothian, Scotland.2 The broad brush strokes that define the foliage in this painting, the pasty treatment of the tree trunk at centre and the suggestion of light and atmosphere in the background are very closely related to similar passages in other mature works by the artist. D’Arthois is not known as a figure painter; the figural staffage in this painting was clearly added by another hand (see Technical Notes). The earlier attribution to Adam Frans van der Meulen is probably correct. The costumes indicate a date for the painting in the third quarter of the 17th century. CF 1 Oil on canvas, 67 x 92 cm, signed and reportedly (1852) dated “1640”, Bruges, Groeningemuseum, inv. no. 34; see Brussels 1965, pp. 8–9 no. 6, illus.; and Thiéry and De Meerendré 1987, pp. 125, 128, 230 no. 23, illus. on p. 129. 2 Oil on wood, 170 x 229 cm, East Lothian, Scotland, Gosford House, Coll. of the Earl of Wemyss; see a photograph on file at the RKD, The Hague. [End] In the foreground of a wooded landscape, a gentleman wearing a bright red coat rides along a sandy road leading out of the forest, accompanied by two men on foot. A patch of sunlight illuminates the group of three travellers. A peasant woman rounds a bend in the path a little further on, as she walks towards an inn nestled amidst the trees. The dense woods of the left half of the composition – dominated by a tall old tree at centre spreading its luxuriant foliage – give way on the right to a more open, atmospheric view of a pond and rolling tree-lined hills stretching into the far distance. The composition and execution of the landscape in this large, signed, painting are entirely characteristic of the work of the landscapist Jacques d’Arthois, a leading exponent of the Brussels school of decorative landscape painting in the second half of the 17th century. D’Arthois’ woodland and forest scenes were undoubtedly inspired by the topography of the Forest of Soignes, a vast area located to the south and east of Brussels. In 1655, at the height of his career, the artist purchased a house at Boisfort, in the heart of the forest. Frequented by local landscape painters in the 17th century, beginning with Denys van Alsloot and Lodewijk de Vadder, among whose followers D’Arthois was a leading spirit (although not a pupil of De Vadder but of Jan Mertens), the dense woods near Soignes, generously interspersed with open heath and numerous small ponds and streams, was a constant source of inspiration for their landscapes. Although large areas remained relatively wild and unpopulated throughout the 17th century, the forest encompassed the ducal castle of Tervueren, as well as other country estates, small hamlets and several convents and monasteries. The sites depict- ed in several of D’Arthois’ landscapes have been identified by the detailed rendering of a distant church or town, but the exact locale of the present painting cannot be precisely identified and – though loosely based on the topography of the Forest of Soignes – is probably imaginary.
Motif categoryLandscape
Collection
TechniquePainting
Object category
Keyword