A wooded river landscape with a farmyard and a dovecote

Salomon Rombouts, son of Gillis, belonged to the distinctive group of painters, known as the Haarlem landscape school, that adopted the popular pictorial schemes and sober style introduced by Jacob Isaacsz. van Ruisdael. Inspired by the beauty of nature in their Haarlem surroundings, they produced a wide range of compositions depicting spacious dune landscapes with bleaching fields, travellers on sandy tracks or everyday life around farmhouses and villages. Among these Haarlem landscapists were Roelof van Vries, Thomas Heeremans, Cornelis Decker, Jan Vermeer II of Haarlem, Gerrit van Hees, Claes Molenaer, Guillaume Dubois and Salomon Rombouts. Their celebrated pictures were highly appreciated and fetched equal prices on the open market. Rombouts moved to Italy at the age of circa thirty-four and he likely remained there until his death.

The present lot is a fine example of Rombouts, as a late representative of the Haarlem School. Tall trees dominate the composition, whereas the small stream along a sandy path leads the eye towards distant dunes. Details such as the busy dovecote and the peasant woman exiting the house with a baking pan under her arm, all add to a vivid atmosphere to the tonal landscape.