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Lot Essay
First recorded in 1834, when described as ‘one of the artist’s best paintings’ (Nieuwenhuys, op. cit.), this is a spectacular example of van de Cappelle’s marine subjects painted at his zenith in the early 1650s. The picture has remained in the same collection since 1835 (when it last changed hands at Christie’s) and it has not been seen in public since 1949 when lent to an exhibition of Dutch marine paintings at Greenwich and Southampton. Margarita Russell, the only scholar to have put together a comprehensive œuvre catalogue raisonné for the artist, remarked already in 1975 that ‘the picture has yellowed and is in need of cleaning’ (op. cit). While this remains the case, the picture’s remarkable qualities are still plain to see.
The Northbrook picture is datable to the years around 1650-52, when the artist, then in his mid-twenties, was producing many of the masterpieces by which he is best known today. It compares closely with a River Scene, dated 1651, which is on the same scale and employs the same compositional structure and similar motifs (Zurich, Kunsthaus). This dating is also supported by the configuration of the signature. The picture is signed on a post in the lower right corner with the spelling: ‘IVCapelle’. According to Wolfgang Stechow, the artist only employed this in 1650/51 before changing to ‘IVCappelle’, although a dated work of 1653, now in the collection of Rose-Marie and Eijk van Otterloo, is signed in the same manner.
By this stage in his career, van de Cappelle’s individual style was fully evolved style, having emerged from the influence of Simon de Vlieger who is thought to have helped him with his earliest forays in painting. From de Vlieger the younger artist developed a fascination with rendering light and atmosphere and, as is evinced by the present work, his mastery of these natural effects was unrivalled. The silvery de Vlieger light developed a more golden tone in these years (which is exaggerated here by the discoloured varnish) and his compositions became more monumental. In this case, from a slightly elevated viewpoint, van de Cappelle shows a busy river estuary with a sailing boat and a rowing boat, both carrying passengers, occupying the central foreground. His prime concern is the natural evocation of the river on a sunny day, under a cloud-filled sky with a breeze blowing across the water. Van de Cappelle delights in the interplay of luminous sky and reflective water, using strong diagonal shadows in the foreground, presumably cast from a bridge, to lead the eye into the scene.
Van de Cappelle’s achievements as an artist are all the more remarkable given that he was largely self-taught. His friend and fellow-artist Gerbrand van den Eeckhout described him as an artist who ‘taught himself to paint out of his own desire'. Certainly, van de Cappelle never had to rely on painting for his livelihood and consequently his oeuvre, consisting of around 150 works, is relatively small. He was wealthy in his own right, the heir to a highly successful cloth dyeing business, which increasingly became his prime concern. There are only a few dated works from the later 1650s and only one from the 1660s (London, National Gallery, where the last digit is unreadable), indicating that the artist gradually wound down his activity as a painter to concentrate on business. This made him a vast fortune, which allowed him to indulge his passion for collecting. He formed one of the largest art collections of his day, with over 7,000 drawings and 192 paintings listed in the inventory drawn up after his death. The paintings, mostly Dutch and Flemish, included works by Goltzius, Rubens, van Dyck, Pieter Bruegel the Elder, Philips Koninck, Hendrick Avercamp, Hercules Seghers and Jan Lievens, as well as a huge holding of marine drawings and paintings by the likes of de Vlieger, Porcellis, van Goyen and van de Velde. He was one of the biggest buyers at the two insolvency sales held for Rembrandt in 1656 and 1658, amassing a collection of over 500 of his drawings and 7 paintings. He holds the singular distinction of having sat for portraits by both Frans Hals and Rembrandt, although unfortunately neither have ever been identified with certainty.
The Northbrook picture is datable to the years around 1650-52, when the artist, then in his mid-twenties, was producing many of the masterpieces by which he is best known today. It compares closely with a River Scene, dated 1651, which is on the same scale and employs the same compositional structure and similar motifs (Zurich, Kunsthaus). This dating is also supported by the configuration of the signature. The picture is signed on a post in the lower right corner with the spelling: ‘IVCapelle’. According to Wolfgang Stechow, the artist only employed this in 1650/51 before changing to ‘IVCappelle’, although a dated work of 1653, now in the collection of Rose-Marie and Eijk van Otterloo, is signed in the same manner.
By this stage in his career, van de Cappelle’s individual style was fully evolved style, having emerged from the influence of Simon de Vlieger who is thought to have helped him with his earliest forays in painting. From de Vlieger the younger artist developed a fascination with rendering light and atmosphere and, as is evinced by the present work, his mastery of these natural effects was unrivalled. The silvery de Vlieger light developed a more golden tone in these years (which is exaggerated here by the discoloured varnish) and his compositions became more monumental. In this case, from a slightly elevated viewpoint, van de Cappelle shows a busy river estuary with a sailing boat and a rowing boat, both carrying passengers, occupying the central foreground. His prime concern is the natural evocation of the river on a sunny day, under a cloud-filled sky with a breeze blowing across the water. Van de Cappelle delights in the interplay of luminous sky and reflective water, using strong diagonal shadows in the foreground, presumably cast from a bridge, to lead the eye into the scene.
Van de Cappelle’s achievements as an artist are all the more remarkable given that he was largely self-taught. His friend and fellow-artist Gerbrand van den Eeckhout described him as an artist who ‘taught himself to paint out of his own desire'. Certainly, van de Cappelle never had to rely on painting for his livelihood and consequently his oeuvre, consisting of around 150 works, is relatively small. He was wealthy in his own right, the heir to a highly successful cloth dyeing business, which increasingly became his prime concern. There are only a few dated works from the later 1650s and only one from the 1660s (London, National Gallery, where the last digit is unreadable), indicating that the artist gradually wound down his activity as a painter to concentrate on business. This made him a vast fortune, which allowed him to indulge his passion for collecting. He formed one of the largest art collections of his day, with over 7,000 drawings and 192 paintings listed in the inventory drawn up after his death. The paintings, mostly Dutch and Flemish, included works by Goltzius, Rubens, van Dyck, Pieter Bruegel the Elder, Philips Koninck, Hendrick Avercamp, Hercules Seghers and Jan Lievens, as well as a huge holding of marine drawings and paintings by the likes of de Vlieger, Porcellis, van Goyen and van de Velde. He was one of the biggest buyers at the two insolvency sales held for Rembrandt in 1656 and 1658, amassing a collection of over 500 of his drawings and 7 paintings. He holds the singular distinction of having sat for portraits by both Frans Hals and Rembrandt, although unfortunately neither have ever been identified with certainty.