Nicolaes Molenaer Haarlem before 1630 - 1676

This recently discovered impressive work is one of the rare views of Haarlem painted by Nicolaes Molenaer whose town and village scenes are usually capriccios rather than topographic depictions.  Here are numerous figures, children and dogs skating, sleighing and playing on the frozen river Spaarne which runs past the town walls of Haarlem. There is an elegantly dressed couple in the foreground who seem to stand out from the rest of the figures; they may have commissioned this work from Molenaer.

In this canvas Molenaer has chosen a viewpoint from the north where the frozen river Spaarne runs along the Eentjes or Leidse Waterpoort with the Langebrug behind. This gate was erected in 1355 and consists of the Goë-Vrou-toren on the left and the Zandertoren on the right. It was called Leidse Waterpoort as this was the gate where tow-boats to and from Leiden landed. Molenaer painted another signed Winter landscape of Haarlem, from the same northern viewpoint, which was with Alfred Brod, London (see his exhibition catalogue, London, February-March 1957, cat. no. 16, reproduced).