DIRK STOOP | A landscape with sportsmen preparing for the hunt, together with their hounds and horses

Hye-Pipyn collection, Ghent (according to a mount at the Witt Library, London);

Anonymous sale, Amsterdam, Sotheby's, 2 November 2004, lot 117;

Art market, London;

Private collection, Europe.

Gand Artistique, vol. III, no. 10, 1 October 1924, p. 230, cat. no. 81, reproduced p. 237.

Stoop painted the present picture in Utrecht, having returned from his Italian sojourn in circa 1635-45. He was best known for his hunting and battle scenes in which Dutch elements and Italian characteristics were combined, as exemplified by the warm, southern light detectable in this painting. The works from his Utrecht period are in fact considered among the best in his œuvre.¹

¹ J. de Meyere, in I Bamboccianti. Niederländische Malerrebellen im Rom des Barock, exh. cat., Cologne 1991, p. 268.