Lot Essay
Jan van Goyen returned to the theme of the watchtower on the river banks on a number of occasions. Two similar panels from the same period, with differences to the boats in the foreground, have come to market in recent years; one dated 1640 (Christie's, Amsterdam, 14 November 2007, lot 135) and another dated 1650 (Christie's, London, 8 December 2021, lot 107). By the 1640s, van Goyen adopted a monochromatic palette, using golden browns create naturalistic landscapes like the one here, though Van Goyen's golden tones break into silvery-blues in the sky, river and distant shore of this landscape.