View of IJsselmonde Seen Across the New Maas

Description

Even though he never ventured to Italy, Aelbert Cuyp distinguished himself as an artist who could evoke the golden light so often associated with southern Europe. Two of his works (View of IJsselmonde Seen across the New Maas (1967.383) and A View of Vianen with a Herdsman and Cattle by a River (2003.169), created around the same time, indicate how he achieved this effect in two different media. In both cases, Cuyp employed a restrained but highly evocative palette in which he selectively contrasted the dark brown elements of the foreground and the expansive gold-cast skies seen beyond the water in the middle ground. Although in the painting he achieved this effect by covering his entire canvas with pigment, it is remarkable to consider the atmospheric effects he created in the drawing with the strategic and minimal use of color on paper.

Provenance

William Mitchell (died 1908), Australia, London, and Eastbourne [blind stamp (Lugt 2638), verso, lower left].  William Pitcairn Knowles (1820–1894), Rotterdam and Wiesbaden [stamp (Lugt 2643), verso, lower center in purple]; sold, Frederik Muller and Company, Amsterdam, June 25, 1895.  Rudolf Philip Goldschmidt (c. 1840–1914), Berlin [stamp (Lugt 2926), verso, lower left, in black]; sold, Prestel, Frankfurt-am-Main, Oct. 4–11, 1917, lot 153. Curt Otto (c. 1880–1929), Leipzig; sold, C. G. Boerner, Leipzig, Nov. 7, 1929, lot 46.  Sold, C. G. Boerner, Leipzig, Apr. 28, 1939, lot 371 to Mertens [correspondence with Dr. F. Carlo Schmid of C. G. Boerner, Mar. 2004 in curatorial file]. Sold by Paul Drey Gallery, New York, to the Art Institute of Chicago, 1967.

View of IJsselmonde Seen Across the New Maas

Aelbert Cuyp

c. 1640

Accession Number

27606

Medium

Brush and black and yellow ochre watercolors, over black chalk, on ivory laid paper

Dimensions

14.5 × 19 cm (5 3/4 × 7 1/2 in.)

Classification

watercolor

Museum

The Art Institute of Chicago

Chicago, United States

Credit Line

Worcester Sketch Fund