HENDRIK VAN MINDERHOUT | EXTENSIVE RHENISH LANDSCAPE WITH PEASANTS AND ANIMALS RESTING IN THE SHADE OF ROMANESQUE RUINS

Lord Talbot de Malahide, Malahide Castle;

The Hon. Rose Talbot;

By whom sold, London, Christie's, 2 April 1976, lot 64;

Anonymous sale, London, Sotheby's, 7 July 1993, lot 49;

There acquired for $117,234.

O. Miller, The Pictures at Malahide Castle, unpublished catalogue, 1953, no. 67.

Although Minderhout, whose nickname was den groenen Ridder van Rotterdam ('the Green knight of Rotterdam'), is better known as a marine painter, this grand, impressive landscape demonstrates his mastery of the landscape genre.  Most of the artist's landscapes, typically grandiose, baroque and Italianate, are more Flemish in character, and it is likely that these works date from after he settled in Antwerp in 1672. The present, rather different picture dates from an earlier phase in the artist's career and its quality is therefore even more remarkable. It is reminiscent of landscapes by Joris van der Haagen.

While the light in the present painting is distinctly Italianate, the landscape is reminiscent of the Rhine valley, and the building at the extreme left is a capriccio of the Valkhof on the Rhine at Nijmegen. The architecture of the extensive ruined structure, perhaps an abbey, is also reminiscent of Romanesque ruins in Northern Europe. There are similarities between it and a ruined Romanesque bridge in a drawing by Minderhout in the Courtauld Institute, which is signed and dated 1662 on the verso.¹ Similar structures in the environs of Utrecht are recorded in drawings by Herman Saftleven. 

1. See D. Farr and W. Bradford, The Northern Landscape: Flemish Dutch, and British Drawings from the Courtauld Collections, exhibition catalogue, London 1986, p. 82, no. 29, reproduced in color (incorrectly attributed to Jan Asselijn).