Barend Cornelis Koekkoek was a pivotal figure in the evolution of Dutch 19th Century painting and achieved international fame as one of the most important landscape painters of his generation, regarded during his lifetime as the ‘Prins der Landschapschilders’. Born in Middelburg in 1803 Barend Cornelis trained, like his brothers, under his father, Johannes Hermanus Koekkoek before joining the Koninklijke Akademie van Beeldende Kunsten in Amsterdam in 1822. Around 1824, the young artist moved to Hilversum, where he dedicated his art to landscape painting. This was a popular subject matter in the Golden Age of Dutch painting in the 17th century and was a continued source of inspiration for 19th century artists. Indeed, Koekkoek's own paintings reveal a careful study and synthesis of his forbearers, and his art is firmly rooted in the traditions established by the 17th century landscapists, such as Hobbema, Cuyp, Ruisdael and Wynants. The golden light and the inclusion of travelers in his work suggests Koekkoek also admired the Dutch Italianate painters of the 17th century, collectively known as the Bamboccianti, especially Pieter van Laer and Jan Both.
From 1830 onwards, Koekkoek undertook several journeys along the Rhine and the Ruhr as the flat Dutch countryside could not satisfy the artist's romantic soul for very long. ‘Surely’, Koekkoek wrote in 1841, ‘our fatherland boasts no rocks, waterfalls, high mountains or romantic valleys. Proud, sublime nature is not to be found in our land.' In the summer of 1834, he moved to the old Ducal capital of Cleves, Germany, where he found his ideal subject matter and would spend the rest of his life. Soon large, gnarled oak trees, winding paths and panoramic views filled his paintings with an artful blend of minute detail and atmospheric effects. In Cleves Koekkoek painted his most important landscapes, ranging from extensive river valleys to idyllic forest views. He often dramatized his trees as a means to emphasize man's paltriness in comparison to nature. In 1841 Koekkoek founded a drawing academy in his new home where he tutored many young artists, which would ultimately become the so-called 'School of Cleves'.
When Koekkoek left the Netherlands in 1834, he was already highly acclaimed as a landscape artist. In 1829 he received his first prize from the Artist Society Felix Meritis for Landscape with a Rainstorm Threatening, which is now in the collection of the Rijksmuseum. In 1832, he was made a member of the Royal Arts Academy in Amsterdam, and it was in the 1830s that the heir to the Dutch throne, Prince Willem II, acquired some of the young artist’s first landscapes. After 1840, Koekkoek’s work was recognized throughout Europe and the artist was honored with gold medals at the Paris Salons. Among the noted collectors of the artist’s work in the 1840s were the King of Prussia, Friedrich-Wilhelm IV and the Russian Crown Prince Alexander, who amassed a large collection of the artist’s work.
Magnificent Romantic landscapes form the core of Koekkoek’s oeuvre and the present lot is a fine example, capturing the essence of the natural world. Here, a traveler and his wife wend their way with their ox-drawn cart through a towering old forest. The trees almost obscure the sky, but golden light filters through the leaves illuminating the painting from the background, the rays falling on the façade of the church in the center of the composition and lighting the pathway before the old building. This pathway, populated by the cart with the traveler’s family perched atop their belongings, begins in shadow in the foreground left. From here, the viewer is led into the sunlit interior of the forest and then even deeper into the wood, where the light once again recedes into the shadows of the trees.
The present lot demonstrates an unusually high level of finish along with a preoccupation for the precise depiction of aged trees that brings to mind the work of Jakob van Ruisdael. The massive contorted branches and knotted trunks of the trees that frame the painting symbolize the enduring nature of life itself. Koekkoek imagined his pictures as the result of an ideal combination of observation and artifice. He studied art and nature with equal acuity, creating beautiful landscape paintings that celebrated the greatness of Creation. ‘Koekkoek's work impresses the spectator by its power, by the firm and correct construction of the trees, by the broad, natural growth of the leaves and boughs, [and] by the careful and elaborate reproduction of the wooded landscape’ (G. H. Marius, Dutch Painters of the Nineteenth Century, Woodbridge, 1973, p. 89). Up to this day, Koekkoek's work is very much favored for the lively composition and the mood of nostalgia, in which the Dutch Golden Age seems to linger on. Just as he was during his own lifetime, Koekkoek is widely regarded as the most accomplished landscape painter of Dutch Romanticism, against whose scrupulously refined paintings the work his contemporaries is measured.
The present lot will be included in Dr. Guido de Werd’s forthcoming B.C. Koekkoek catalogue raisonné as no. 61.6.