.jpg?w=1)
Lot Essay
Isaac van Ostade's most significant contribution to seventeenth-century Dutch art consisted of paintings such as A winter landscape with villagers on a frozen canal, combinations of landscape views and genre elements in a cold, wintry environment. As with many of his winter scenes, this landscape revolves around the diagonal of the frozen river framed on the left by a shaded foreground and on the right by buildings on the river's bank. Isaac's interest in genre scenes, reflected in the works of his brother Adriaen van Ostade, is the quotidian lives of the lower classes, a combination of work and play that rarely includes the finely dressed figures and elegant sleighs that appear in the winter scenes of Philips Wouwerman. While the muted palette and single winter-weary tree in the middleground emphasize the earthbound nature of the scene, the scale of the painting lends it a monumentality more often associated with the more idealized landscapes of artists such as Salomon van Ruysdael.
The winter landscape was one of Isaac's favorite subjects. His earliest dated treatment of the theme is from 1641 but the majority of his winter scenes are dated between 1642 and 1647. Many of the same motifs, among them the white horse in the middleground, appear frequently in his winter landscapes but such repetition does not suggest a lack of engagement with the subject. Indeed, there are over two hundred drawings attributed to Ostade, a testament to his interest in first-hand observation. A winter landscape with villagers on a frozen canal was most likely painted after 1646, when Ostade's handling becomes broader and his contours softer.
Isaac was first apprenticed to his elder brother, Adriaen, and his early works are heavily dependent upon and, in certain cases indistinguishable from, those of his brother. He most likely also studied with Salomon van Ruysdael, as suggested by a document of 1640 that records a lawsuit brought by Salomon against Adriaen for sums due for board and tuition. Stylistic similarities, among them the use of yellow and pink in the sky, also link the works of Isaac and Salomon. Ostade's career lasted only a decade. His first dated painting is from 1639, he became a master in the Haarlem Guild of St. Luke in 1643, and he died in 1649. Within that short period of time, his output was prodigious.
The winter landscape was one of Isaac's favorite subjects. His earliest dated treatment of the theme is from 1641 but the majority of his winter scenes are dated between 1642 and 1647. Many of the same motifs, among them the white horse in the middleground, appear frequently in his winter landscapes but such repetition does not suggest a lack of engagement with the subject. Indeed, there are over two hundred drawings attributed to Ostade, a testament to his interest in first-hand observation. A winter landscape with villagers on a frozen canal was most likely painted after 1646, when Ostade's handling becomes broader and his contours softer.
Isaac was first apprenticed to his elder brother, Adriaen, and his early works are heavily dependent upon and, in certain cases indistinguishable from, those of his brother. He most likely also studied with Salomon van Ruysdael, as suggested by a document of 1640 that records a lawsuit brought by Salomon against Adriaen for sums due for board and tuition. Stylistic similarities, among them the use of yellow and pink in the sky, also link the works of Isaac and Salomon. Ostade's career lasted only a decade. His first dated painting is from 1639, he became a master in the Haarlem Guild of St. Luke in 1643, and he died in 1649. Within that short period of time, his output was prodigious.