JAN DIRKSZ BOTH | A HILLY ITALIAN LANDSCAPE WITH TRAVELERS

Probably, Collection of J. van der Linden van Slingelandt, Dordrecht, 1752;

Mr. Brown of Dorchester, England (per 1807 sale catalogue);

Edward Coxe;

Sale, London, Peter Coxe’s, 23 April 1807, lot 65 (unsold);

Mrs. Coxe, by 1822;

Adrian John Hope, (1811-1863) Deepdene;

His estate sale, London, Christie's, 30 June 1894, lot 17 (£609 to P. and D. Colnaghi);

Private collection, Europe;

Art market, Vienna, 1940s;

Bohemia between 1946 and 1951 (per stamp of Státní památkový úřad pro Čechy v Praze on verso);

With Richard Green, London, 1989;

Private collection, USA.

G. Hoet, Catalogue of Naamlyst van schilderyen, vol. 11, 1752, p. 493;

J. Smith, A Catalogue Raisonné of the Works of the Most Eminent Dutch, Flemish and French Painters, vol. VI, London 1835, p. 183, no. 31;

W. Roberts, A Record of Art Sales from 1766-1896, vol. 11, p. 236;

C. Hofstede de Groot, A Catalogue Raisonné of the Works of the Most Eminent Dutch Painters of the Seventeenth Century, vol. IX, 1926, p. 457, no. 118;

J. Burke, Jan Both, New York 1976, p. 334, no. 118.

Jan Both was one of the most innovative artists belonging to the second generation of Dutch Italianate painters. His landscapes combine familiar figures and motifs to capture the warmth and light of Italy, and this painting is an especially fine example of Both's mature style, practiced after his return to Utrecht from Italy in 1642. It is difficult to determine the chronology of Both's works in the last ten years of his life, as only one painting is dated. The subject of travelers on a path surrounded by tall trees and mountains was a favorite of Both's, and these elements along with the contrast between the shadowy foreground and well-lit road appear in some of his works dating to the early 1640s.¹ Toward the end of his career, Both began to paint larger scale works with a palette of deeper greens and blues not seen here, making it likely that the present lot dates to the mid-1640s.²

The interesting provenance of this picture begins in 1752, when Gerard Hoet described it as "a very fresh landscape, depicting great warmth, by Jan Both, wherein are depicted his customary figures, such as a woman on horseback who is climbing the hill, a drover, and an angler in the distance. h(eight) 28 in. or br(eadth) 39 in." The painting was then owned by the famous Dordrecht collector, master minter and iron trader, Johan van der Linden van Slingelandt, who filled his home on the Walenvest with outstanding paintings by Aelbert Cuyp and other Dutch Italianate artists. In 1894, the painting was sold from the collection of Adriaen Hope, who died bankrupt under suspicious circumstances and was believed to have defrauded the Bank of England. 

1. See for example Rocky landscape with ox-cart, oil on canvas, 120.5 by 160.5 cm. National Gallery, London, no. 1917.

2. See Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, inv.C109; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, inv.34.239; Louvre, Paris, no.1065 and Statens Museum, Copenhagen, inv. Sp.430.