Joseph Coomans

Sale: Sotheby's, New York, 27 October 1988, lot 283 (erroneously dated 1866)
Mathaf Gallery, London
Private Collection, London (acquired from the above in 1990)

A pupil of Nicaise de Keyser at the Antwerp Academy, Coomans first travelled to Algeria in 1843. There he met French artist Horace Vernet, whose influence may be seen in the present work. Coomans takes the Algerian rifleman's perspective as he lies in wait preparing an ambush, his enemy suggested by the marching forces just visible in the lower-right of the composition, making their way through a mountain pass. The present work is a prime example of the Orientalist works Coomans painted in the 1840s, before he turned his attention to subjects taken from the Classical world in the next decade.