A winter landscape with figures skating, cottages and a church beyond

We are grateful to Dr. Middendorf for confirming the attribution of this hitherto unpublished work on the basis of photographs. As pointed out by Dr. Ulrick Middendorf, this composition was probably inspired by Jan van de Capelle's picture of 1653 in the Mauritshuis, The Hague. It clearly proved successful for Dubbels, as at least three other versions are known, all of which vary considerably in their detail and the deployment of figures. These include one on a similar scale in the Nationalmuseum, Stockholm; one formerly attributed to Backhuysen in the Statens Museum voor Kunst, Copenhagen; and another recently sold at Christie's, New York, 15 April 2008, lot 280 ($43,000; see U. Middendorf, Hendrik Jacobsz. Dubbels (1621-1707), Freren, 1989, pp. 177-79, nos. 138 and 142).