Aelbert Cuyp

Exhibited by Bijl-Van Urk Masterpaintings, Alkmaar (NL)

Material Oil on canvas

Dimensions 65.8 x 77 cm

Place of Creation Dordrecht

Price Price on request

Status Vetted

About the Work

John Smith, who was the first to publish this painting in the 1842 Supplement to his multi-volume Catalogue Raisonné, effusively described it as 'an example of the highest excellence, offering a rich display of the golden hues and magic tints of this painter’s unrivalled palette’ (loc. cit.). Upon its appearance at auction thirty-four years later, The Times (5 June 1876, p.

12) praised the ‘beautiful effect of early morning.’ A warm afternoon light casts long shadows on the path, creating a contre-jour that intensifies the sense of depth as the landscape recedes into the silvery blues in the background. The masterful use of light and bright, varied palette exemplifies the visual vocabulary for which Cuyp is most known today.

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Provenance

Thomas B. Brown (c. 1790-1875), London, and by whom sold in 1839 for 600 gns. to,
Edmund Foster (1793-1862), Clewer Manor, Windsor, Berkshire, and by descent to his son,
Edmund Benson Foster (1824-1917), Clewer Manor, Windsor, Berkshire; his sale, Christie's, London, 3 June 1876, lot 12, where acquired for 4,800 gns. by Rutte on behalf of,
Baron Alphonse de Rothschild (1827-1905), Paris.
Baron Édouard de Rothschild (1868-1949), Paris.
Confiscated from the above by the Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg following the Nazi occupation of Paris after May 1940 (ERR no. R 11).
Recovered by the Monuments Fine Arts and Archives Section from the Altaussee salt mines, Austria, and transferred to the Munich Central Collecting Point on 20 June 1945 (MCCP no. 1013/1).
Returned to France on 27 March 1946 and restituted to the Rothschild family.
By descent to the present owners.

Literature

J. Smith, Supplement to the Catalogue Raisonné of the Works of the Most Eminent Dutch, Flemish, and French Painters, London, 1842, IX, pp. 652-653, no.12.
G. F. Waagen, Treasures of art in Great Britain: being an account of the chief collections of paintings, drawings, sculptures, illuminated mss., &c. &c., London, 1854, II, p. 452, as 'Albert Cuyp'.
C. Hofstede de Groot, A Catalogue Raisonné of the Works of the Most Eminent Dutch Painters of the Seventeenth Century, London, 1909, II, p. 140, no.457, as 'Aelbert Cuyp'.
Répertoire des biens spoliés en France durant la guerre, 1939–1945: II: Tableaux, tapisseries et sculptures, Paris, 1947, p. 103, no. 1796.
S. Reiss, Aelbert Cuyp, London, 1975, p. 195 and 208 , no.155, as 'Cuyp follower unknown date', illustrated in black and white.