Adriaen van de Velde (Amsterdam 1636 - Amsterdam 1672)

This sunlit pastoral landscape showcases Adriaen van de Velde’s intense skill, one which he demonstrated throughout his career, for depicting animals. In his Pastoral Landscape with Sheep and Peasants, van de Velde focuses on the two sheep which dominate the foreground of this narrow composition. They face in opposite directions, with one standing, whilst the other settles placidly on its haunches. By employing contrasting poses, van de Velde provides a more rounded and complete study of the animals.

One of the sheep stares out directly at the viewer, further focusing attention on the pair. Beyond, outside a small thatched hut, two peasants sit chatting in the sunshine, while a third sheep, fully shorn, grazes nearby. The silhouette of distant mountains lends the painting a sense of perspective and hints at an extensive landscape beyond. Van de Velde, however, opts to focus almost exclusively on the depiction of the animals and the bright sky, to which he has devoted over half of the canvas. From this expanse of blue, animated by the gentle billowing of soft white clouds, falls a shaft of light, suffusing the sheep in a warm golden glow. This warmth reflects the influence of Dutch Italianate painters, such as Nicholaes Berchem (1620-1683) and Jan Asselijn (after 1610-1652) although there is no evidence to suggest that van de Velde himself visited Italy.

The same idealised bucolic atmosphere is similarly represented in van de Velde’s The Hut, which evokes a comparable southern ambience. The Hut also demonstrates the artist’s keen ability in depicting a variety of animals. According to the biographer Arnold Houbraken (1660-1719), van de Velde went ‘into the field’ daily to draw animals and landscapes; the results of such meticulous study are clearly evident in these paintings.¹ As well as the numerous sheep, the clearing in The Hut is also populated by three hulking cows, a horse and two figures.

In the later part of his career, as explained by Marian Bisanz-Prakken, ‘figures played an increasingly important role in van de Velde’s landscapes’, as evidenced in works such as Stop in the Way.² When compared to the present work this enhanced role is very much apparent, the Hermitage’s painting nevertheless draws similarities with the present work, providing us with a further demonstration of van de Velde’s brilliance at representing animals. The broken tree trunk in the foreground is further echoed in the present work, and is a recurring motif in the paintings of van de Velde’s master Jan Wijnants (c.1635-1684). The esteem in which Wijnants held his pupil meant that he frequently employed van de Velde to paint the staffage in his works such was his skill in depicting animals and figures.

¹ Arnold Houbraken, De groote Schouburgh der Nederlantsche Konstschilders en Schilderessen, (1753), vol. II, p. 90.
² Marian Bisanz-Prakken, Rembrandt and his Time, (Hudson Hills, 2005) p. 118.