River landscape with a carriage transporting passengers and a ferry crossing

This large, unpublished canvas by Jan Wildens is a beautifully characteristic example of his mastery of the landscape genre. A leading landscape painter in Antwerp during the first half of the seventeenth century, Wildens frequently collaborated with his contemporaries, most notably Peter Paul Rubens, Jacob Jordaens and Frans Snyders. In 1614, ten years after he was appointed a master of the Guild of St Luke in Antwerp, he travelled to Italy where he became familiar with the work of Paul Bril, who had a marked influence on his style; his landscapes became calmer, more classicised and bucolic in nature. The present work exemplifies Wildens’ ability to create a monumental yet harmonious sense of air and space in his landscapes, with large trees in the foreground framing a rural scene, receding towards a body of water and rolling hills in the far distance.