Landscape

c. 1670

Jacob van Ruisdael

Artist, Dutch, c. 1628/1629 - 1682

We look across a river and slightly up at a pair of tall, leafy trees framed by steely-gray clouds against a a vivid blue sky in this nearly square landscape painting. A spindly trunk with only a few leafy branches grows near the towering trees, which are at the center of the picture, and a band of dark green trees grows along the river beyond them. The river runs toward us from the distance to our right into the lower left corner of the canvas, tumbling down a low waterfall near the bottom center of the painting. The river is lined with caramel-brown boulders. A woman and small child walk away from us on a footbridge spanning the river, to our left. The woman wears a white cap and apron, a dark bodice over a white shirt, and a red skirt. She carries the handle of a large basket hooked over her right forearm and the child, wearing a tan hat and jacket and brown pants, walks on her opposite side. A white dog near the woman seems to have paused to look into the forest. The horizon of the river comes about a quarter of the way up the composition so the trees, sky, and clouds fill most of the painting. The artist signed the painting as if he had written his name on a rock to the left of center: “J v Ruisdael.”

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Jacob van Ruisdael represents the pinnacle of seventeenth-century Dutch landscape painting. This great artist, the son of a painter and the nephew of Salomon van Ruysdael (see NGA 2007.116.1), began his career in Haarlem but moved to Amsterdam in about 1656. His long and productive career yielded a wide variety of landscape scenes that reflect Ruisdael’s vision of the grandeur and powerful forces of nature.

In this landscape, a waterfall transforms the gentle flow of a small river into a turbulent stream that rushes toward a wooden bridge. A mother and child, accompanied by their dog, cross the bridge toward a path into a densely forested, somewhat hilly terrain. Three large oak trees—one dead, one withering, and one sturdy specimen—dominate the center of the composition. The juxtaposition of dead and broken trees with a fast-flowing stream in a rocky landscape is likely an allegorical reference to the transience of life. Ruisdael often composed his scenes so as to limit the viewer's easy access into the landscape, thereby increasing the tension in his art. This painting offers a good example of that principle: The opposite shore can be reached only by way of the bridge, but the juncture of the bridge and the near shore is inaccessible to the viewer as it occurs outside of the picture.

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Artwork overview

  • Medium

    oil on canvas

  • Credit Line

    Samuel H. Kress Collection

  • Dimensions

    overall: 53.2 x 60 cm (20 15/16 x 23 5/8 in.)
    framed: 78.7 x 85.1 x 9.5 cm (31 x 33 1/2 x 3 3/4 in.)

  • Accession

    1961.9.85

More About this Artwork

Scholarly Article:  Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth Century: Landscape, c. 1670

This horizontal painting shows a group of eight light-skinned musicians and onlookers gathered closely around a rectangular, carpet-covered table. The front edge of the table runs parallel to the bottom edge of the painting, and seems close to us. Shown from about the waist up, the men and women’s vivid lapis-blue, coral-red, buttercup-yellow, lilac-purple, and moss-green garments fall in crisp folds. Bright reflections on the fabric suggest a satin-like material. Two women wear feathers in their hair and one man’s hat is plumed. One man, wearing crimson red and black, sits with his back to us to our left on the near side of the table. He holds the neck of a bass viol, about the size of a cello, with his left hand, and points to pages of an open music book with the bow in his right hand. The other people cluster on the far side of the table. A man to the left plays a violin; a woman at the center plays a guitar-sized bandora, and a woman to our right plays a lute. The musicians, along with a man who leans over the table from between the two women, look down at the music books. A young man behind the woman at the center holds up a glass of pale liquid with his right hand as he touches his left forefinger to his smiling lips. A man and woman stand close together in the background to our right, in the top right corner of the canvas.

Scholarly Series:  Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth Century

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Baron Etienne Martin de Beurnonville [1789-1876], château de la Chapelle, Labbeville, Val d'Oise; (his estate sale, by Pillet, Paris, 9-14 and 16 May 1881[12 May], no. 453); (Charles Sedelmeyer, Paris). Prince Johann II of Liechtenstein [1840-1929], Vienna and later Vaduz, by 1896;[1] (Frederick Mont, New York); purchased 18 October 1951 by the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, New York;[2] gift 1961 to NGA.
[1] The first reference to the existence of the painting in the Liechtenstein Collection is in 1896 (see Wilhelm von Bode, Die Fürstlich Liechtenstein'sche Galerie in Wien, Vienna, 1896, 99). Gustav Friedrich Waagen's earlier account of a Ruisdael Landscape with a Bridge in the Liechtenstein Collection (Gustav Friedrich Waagen, Die vornehmsten Kunstdenkmäler in Wien, Vienna, 1866: 287), must refer to a different work because the Washington painting was sold by the Baron de Beurnonville only in 1881. The provenance given in Strohmer's 1943 catalogue of the Liechtenstein Collection (Erich V. Strohmer, Die Gemäldegalerie des Fürstern Liechtenstein in Wien, Vienna, 1943) is incorrect; in the 1948 Lucerne exhibition catalogue (Meisterwerke aus den Sammlungen des Fürsten von Liechtenstein, Kunstmuseum), this painting's provenance was associated with the wrong painting.
[2] The bill from Frederick Mont to the Kress Foundation for three paintings from the Liechtenstein collection, including this one, is dated 18 October 1951; payment was made four days later (copy of annotated bill in NGA curatorial files, see also The Kress Collection Digital Archive, https://kress.nga.gov/Detail/objects/1217).

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1948

  • Meisterwerke aus den Sammlungen des Fürsten von Liechtenstein, Kunstmuseum, Lucerne, 1948, no. 175.

1997

  • Rembrandt and the Golden Age: Dutch Paintings from the National Gallery of Art, The Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, 1997, unnumbered brochure.

1999

  • Masterpieces from the National Gallery of Art, Washington, Kyoto Municipal Museum of Art; Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum, 1999, no. 82, repro.

Bibliography

1896

  • Bode, Wilhem von. Die Fürstlich Liechtenstein'sche Galerie in Wien. Vienna, 1896: 99.

1904

  • Suida, Wilhelm. Die Gemäldegalerie der K. K. Akademie d. Bildenden Kunst: Die Sammlungen Liechtenstein, Czernin, Harrach und Schönborn-Buchheim. Moderner Cicerone 2. Stuttgart, Berlin, and Leipzig, 1904: 116.

1907

  • Hofstede de Groot, Cornelis. A Catalogue Raisonné of the Works of the Most Eminent Dutch Painters of the Seventeenth Century. 8 vols. Translated by Edward G. Hawke. London, 1907-1927: 4(1912):94, no. 295, 129, no. 407.

  • Hofstede de Groot, Cornelis. Beschreibendes und kritisches Verzeichnis der Werke der hervorragendsten holländischen Maler des XVII. Jahrhunderts. 10 vols. Esslingen and Paris, 1907-1928: 4(1911):89, no. 295.

1908

  • Höss, Karl. Fürst Johann II. von Liechtenstein und die bildende Kunst. Vienna, 1908: 58, I.14, repro.

1911

  • Preyer, David C. The Art of the Vienna Galleries. The Art Galleries of Europe. Boston, 1911: 247-248.

1927

  • Kronfeld, Adolf. Führer durch die Fürstlich-Liechtensteinsche Gemäldegalerie in Wien. Vienna, 1927: 184-185, no. 911.

1928

  • Rosenberg, Jakob. Jacob van Ruisdael. Berlin, 1928: 87, no. 252.

1943

  • Strohmer, Erich V. Die Gemäldegalerie des Fürsten Liechtenstein in Wien. Vienna, 1943: 101, pl. 69.

1948

  • Meisterwerke aus den Sammlungen des Fürsten von Liechtenstein. Exh. cat. Kunstmuseum, Lucerne, 1948: no. 175.

1959

  • Paintings and Sculpture from the Samuel H. Kress Collection. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1959: 322, repro.

1964

  • Gorissen, Friedrich. Conspectus Cliviae. Die klevische Residenz in der Kunst des 17. Jahrhunderts. Kleve, 1964: no. 62.

1965

  • Summary Catalogue of European Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1965: 119.

1968

  • National Gallery of Art. European Paintings and Sculpture, Illustrations. Washington, 1968: 106, repro.

1975

  • National Gallery of Art. European paintings: An Illustrated Summary Catalogue. Washington, 1975: 316, repro.

1977

  • Eisler, Colin. Paintings from the Samuel H. Kress Collection: European Schools Excluding Italian. Oxford, 1977: 146-147, fig. 132, as Landscape with a Little Waterfall.

1981

  • Slive, Seymour, and Hans Hoetink. Jacob van Ruisdael. Exh. cat. The Royal Cabinet of Paintings Mauritshuis, The Hague; The Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts. New York, 1981: 151.

  • Schmidt, Winfried. Studien zur Landschaftskunst Jacob van Ruisdaels: Frühwerke und Wanderjahre. Hildesheim, 1981: 75, pl. 22.

1982

  • Cleveland Museum of Art. European Paintings of the 16th, 17th, and 18th Centuries. Catalog of Paintings 3. Cleveland, 1982: 265.

1985

  • National Gallery of Art. European Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. Washington, 1985: 364, repro.

1986

  • Sutton, Peter C. A Guide to Dutch Art in America. Grand Rapids and Kampen, 1986: 306.

1995

  • Wheelock, Arthur K., Jr. Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth Century. The Collections of the National Gallery of Art Systematic Catalogue. Washington, 1995: 343-345, color repro. 344.

1999

  • Shimada, Norio, and Haruko Ota. Masterpieces from the National Gallery of Art, Washington. Exh. cat. Kyoto Municipal Museum of Art; Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum. Tokyo, 1999: no. 82, repro.

2001

  • Slive, Seymour. Jacob van Ruisdael: A Complete Catalogue of his Paintings, Drawings and Etchings. New Haven, 2001: 244, no. 296, repro.

2004

  • Keyes, George S., et al. Masters of Dutch Painting: The Detroit Institute of Arts. London, 2004: 204, fig. 1.

  • Allen, Eva J. A Vision of Nature: The Landscapes of Philip Koch: Retrospective, 1971-2004. Exh. cat. University of Maryland University College, Adelphi, 2004: 14, 16, fig. 7.

2021

  • Wheelock, Arthur K., Jr. "In Pursuit of Masterpieces: The National Gallery of Art's Acquisitions from The Prince of Liecthenstein." Artibus et historiae 42, no. 83 (2021): 317, 320, color fig. 8, 329 n. 15.

Inscriptions

lower center on rock to left: J v Ruisdael (JvR in ligature)

Wikidata ID

Q20177629

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