Figures and skaters on a frozen river, a village beyond

Van Goyen was particularly active as a draughtsman in the 1650s, and specifically in the year 1653, from which circa 250 drawings survive. The drawings of the largest format from this year, of which the present drawing and the one in the next lot are particularly fine examples, show the artist's fully developed mature style. Both sheets were grouped by Beck together with six others of similar size and execution (H.-U. Beck, op. cit., I, nos. Z 356, 372, 389, 434, 554 and 555). The large output of drawings in the 1650s might be explained by the artist's financial situation at the time: speculation in real estate resulted in debts, which forced him to sell his art collection in two auctions in 1652 and 1654. Van Goyen's production of finished drawings, offered directly to the market, may have given the artist a very welcome income at this difficult time. Despite his prolific and successful career as an artist, he died in poverty, at least 18,000 guilders in debt (ibid., pp. 19-20).