Lot 198
  • 198

Jan van de Cappelle

Estimate
40,000 - 60,000 GBP
bidding is closed

Description

  • Jan van de Cappelle
  • Winter Landscape with a man fixing a sled at the edge of a frozen river
  • signed with monogram on the end of the log lower centre: IVC
  • oil on canvas
  • 50 by 43 cm

Provenance

Possibly H. Muilman, Amsterdam;
His sale, Amsterdam, 12 April 1813, lot 32;
Arthur Kay (d.1939), Glasgow;
His sale, London, Christie's, 11 May 1901, lot 18 (unsold);
Acquired in Amsterdam by Prince Johann II of Liechtenstein (1840-1929) for 3,900 florins.

Exhibited

Glasgow, City Museum and Art Gallery, 1905, on loan;
Amsterdam, Frederick Muller and Co., 1907, no. 3;
Lucerne, Kunstmuseum, Meisterwerke aus den Sammlungen Fursten von Liechtenstein, 1948, no. 183.

Literature

C. Hofstede de Groot, A Catalogue Raisonné....., vol. VII, London 1923, pp. 199, 203, 208, nos. 147, 163a and 178;
A. Kronfeld, Führer durch die Fürstlich Liechtensteinsche Gemäldegalerie in Wien, Vienna 1931, pp. 176-177, no. 883;
W. Stechow, Dutch Landscape Painting of the Seventeenth Century, London 1966, p. 204, note. 48;
M. Russell, Jan van de Capelle 1624/6-1679, Leigh-on-Sea 1975, p.83, no. 147, reproduced fig. 93;
R. Baumstark, Meisterwerke der Sammlungen des Fürsten von Liechtenstein. Gemälde, Zürich 1980, pp. 92, 222,182.

Catalogue Note

This is a rare winter scene by Van de Capelle, who was better known for his marine paintings. Hofstede de Groot lists just thirty eight winter landscapes in his Catalogue Raisonné (op. cit. nos. 143-180), and the present work is one of the few of those listed which can still be accounted for.

Although Jan van de Cappelle's winter scenes have often been confused in the past with the works of his contemporary Aert van der Neer, as Russell observes, their work are easily distinguished. Whereas Aert van der Neer's winter landscapes are lively, well-populated genre affairs, Van de Cappelle's figures tend to be secondary to his austere study of nature.1 Indeed, the current work features just three figures, all of whom are dwarfed and subordinated by their rather menacing surroundings, especially the fallen trees in the foreground. As such the current work should be compared to two further upright winter landscapes, Frozen Canal in Enschede and Winter Landscape in an English Private Collection.2

In works such as this, with their concentration upon atmosphere and light instead of traditional winter pastimes, Jan van de Cappelle ranks alongside Jacob van Ruisdael in his elevation of winter scenes to the realm of pure landscape painting; a remarkable achievement, considering that he was a self-taught artist.

1. See M. Russell, op. cit., p. 31.
2. ibid. figs. 28 and fig. 30 respectively.