Jacob van Ruisdael

Jacob van Ruisdael began on a well-tilled field

Jacob van Ruisdael was born in Haarlem in around 1628. His path to art was predestined from the beginning, with his father Isaak and uncle Salomon already having made glittering names as painters and providing expert tuition. The wealth and prosperity of Haarlem offered a young man from a good background an ideal environment in which to quietly develop as an artist. Even at the early age of seventeen, Jacob van Ruisdael could therefore boast a handsome oeuvre, although haw was still strongly influenced by his uncle and the latter’s colleagues, the equally established Pieter de Molijn and Cornelis Vroom. However, it didn’t take long for the young Jacob to develop his own style, which stood out from the general work of his time for its strong contrasts and a high level of expression. 

Nature as a source of multilayered symbolism

In contrast to his famous uncle Salomon, Jacon van Ruisdael loved to travel, which gave him much inspiration. With his painter friend Nicolaes Berchem, he travelled in the German-Dutch border region and sometimes beyond. Many of the impressions gathered found their way into Ruisdael’s pictures but he hardly ever limited himself in his art to what he saw, often going beyond in his creativity. His pictures were compositions of the familiar, the individual elements of which the artist combined to create a new overall picture that gained its own unique dynamism from the constant tension between stillness and movement. Over the years, a symbolism that has never been fully explored became ever more pronounced: from the nature of many trees, houses or formations, deeper approaches to meaning beyond all representationalism can be discerned. At the same time, Ruisdael never became symbolic-abstract, but on the contrary, captivated by the meticulous care of depiction, based on a keep power of observation. 

Benchmark and model for entire generations of painters 

Jacob van Ruisdael is also attested as a doctor from 1678, but to what extent he actually practiced this profession is disputed in the research. What is certain is that his productivity declined sharply in the last years of his life – whether this circumstance is due to his work as a doctor or his deteriorating health, must remain open. The exact date of his death is also unknown, but Jacob van Ruisdael most probably died in Spring 1628 in Amsterdam and was buried on 14th March of that year in his hometown of Haarlem. He never married and did not have any children, but his extensive oeuvre was consistently copied and distributed so that his name earned considerable posthumous fame. His influence stretched far into the 19th century and no subsequent landscape painter could avoid his visually powerful legacy. Eight-figure sums are still paid today for Jacob van Ruisdael’s paintings, although many of his works are in a number of the world’s most important museums and thus unobtainable for collectors.