NICOLAES PIETERSZ. BERCHEM | A rocky southern landscape with two peasant women and their flock and cattle halting near a stream

Pieter Rainer, by 1834;

H. Wetzlar, Amsterdam;

With Galerie Sankt Lucas, by 1963.

J. Smith, A catalogue raisonné..., vol. V, London 1834, p. 61, cat. no. 182;

C. Hofstede de Groot, A catalogue raisonné..., vol. IX, London 1926, p. 138, cat. no. 300. 

It is very likely Berchem travelled to Italy, even if not confirmed by existing documents, due to the many paintings he executed in warm tones that evoke the Italian countryside, such as the present work.

It is likely that Berchem reused larger compositions giving them a more Italianate tone following the fashion of the day: one, undated, was recorded in the Alte Pinakothek, Munich, by 1904 (inv. no. 598) and is currently in Bamberg, Bavaria;¹ the other is kept in the Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister, Dresden.² It bears the same date, but instead of the southern setting, the castle of Bentheim is in the background - a feature also found in works by Berchem's contemporaries, such as Jacob van Ruisdael (1628/29-82). 

¹ Hofstede de Groot 1926, cat. no. 289.

² P. Biesboer et al., Nicolaes Berchem, In het licht van Italië, exh. cat., Haarlem 2007, p. 42.