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Lot Essay
Painted on a small scale, this panel exemplifies Salomon van Ruysdael’s use of wet-in-wet brushwork to convey atmosphere. Quick, short strokes, rich in impasto capture the play of light on the shallow water as it moves in the breeze. Longer strokes of silvery-blue paint indicate the distant horizon, dotted with trees and a church spire. Ruysdael painted a range of landscapes in his nearly five-decade-long career, but he reached his zenith in his depictions of rivers and estuaries from the early 1630s on. As in the present painting, these landscapes often have no recognizable landmarks or central subject, focusing instead on the quiet beauty of everyday life in Holland. Here, the artist reveals his gift for depicting incidental detail in the way the crew huddle together against the wind and in the trailing plumes of smoke drifting from the cottages at right.
The first recorded owner of this charming marine was Sir William Cornelius van Horne, a formidable collector who brought together works by the likes of El Greco, Delacroix, Goya, Murillo, Rubens and Hals. Van Horne was a self-made success: after studying law at Union College, he sought his fortune in the American West. When his home, barns, and personal library were destroyed by fire, he returned to his native Illinois and began working in railroads. He moved to Canada in 1882, having been appointed general manager of the Canadian Pacific Railway. There, he oversaw the construction of the first Canadian transcontinental railway. He latterly expanded into hotels, directing the design and construction of the iconic Château Frontenac in Quebec City and the Château Lake Louise in Alberta.
After descending in the Van Horne family for the better part of a century, the painting was purchased by Charles C. Cunningham Jr., an avid sailor and collector of Dutch paintings who served as a long-time Trustee of the Harvard Art Museums and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Cunningham had a particular taste for works by Ruysdael, also possessing the artist’s exceptional River landscape with a ferry, which was latterly in the collection of Rose-Marie and Eijk van Otterloo (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston).
The first recorded owner of this charming marine was Sir William Cornelius van Horne, a formidable collector who brought together works by the likes of El Greco, Delacroix, Goya, Murillo, Rubens and Hals. Van Horne was a self-made success: after studying law at Union College, he sought his fortune in the American West. When his home, barns, and personal library were destroyed by fire, he returned to his native Illinois and began working in railroads. He moved to Canada in 1882, having been appointed general manager of the Canadian Pacific Railway. There, he oversaw the construction of the first Canadian transcontinental railway. He latterly expanded into hotels, directing the design and construction of the iconic Château Frontenac in Quebec City and the Château Lake Louise in Alberta.
After descending in the Van Horne family for the better part of a century, the painting was purchased by Charles C. Cunningham Jr., an avid sailor and collector of Dutch paintings who served as a long-time Trustee of the Harvard Art Museums and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Cunningham had a particular taste for works by Ruysdael, also possessing the artist’s exceptional River landscape with a ferry, which was latterly in the collection of Rose-Marie and Eijk van Otterloo (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston).