Lot 39: ANTHONIE VERSTRAELEN GORINCHEM 1594 - 1641 AMSTERDAM

THE PROPERTY OF A DUTCH FAMILY

A WINTER LANDSCAPE WITH ELEGANT FIGURES SKATING AND A COUPLE IN A HORSE-DRAWN SLEIGH ON THE ICE

measurements note
26.9 by 40.9 cm.

signed in monogram lower right: AVS (in ligature)

oil on panel

PROVENANCE

With Willem Sloot, Amsterdam (according to a label on the frame);
Anonymous sale, Cologne, Lempertz, 14-16 December 1922, lot 141 (as Hendrick Avercamp).

NOTE

A native of the provincial town of Gorinchem, Verstraelen moved to Amsterdam before 1628 and specialised in painting winter scenes with figures skating on frozen lakes and rivers (although a single Summer landscape has recently surfaced, sold in these Rooms, 18 May 2004, lot 105).

He must have been influenced by Hendrick Avercamp (1585-1634), whose innovations in the depiction of winter scenes Verstraelen incorporated fully into his works. Verstraelen executed his winter landscapes very much in the tradition of Avercamp, characteristic both in its high viewpoint and the inclusion of various narrative elements, which together gives such winter scenes rather the air of tableaux vivants. Verstraelen's thin and draftsman-like brushwork is reminiscent of the Flemish followers of Pieter Brueghel the Elder (active 1551-1569), like David Vinckboons (1576-c.1632). The artist effectively evokes a wintery atmosphere through his rendering of tempered sunlight, strong enough to cast shadow next to the figures, and reflections in the ice, but filtered through a haze that dissolves the distant view. The horizontal expanse of the ice thus dominates the landscape.