Lot 1024 Nα

The composition and motif of this panoramic mountainous landscape are typical of Netherlandish landscape painting around 1600. The artist uses the classic three-colour compositional scheme to evoke width and depth in the landscape: Brown for the foreground, green for the mid-ground and blue for the horizon. The viewer's gaze is led diagonally across the work by a path winding into the distance. A horse cart is depicted in the right foreground, two heavily laden travellers in the centre and a small group of figures in the left background. The landscape is bracketed by two tall rock formations which provide a window looking out towards the horizon. Klaus Ertz attributes this work to the artist's later phase of the 1620s and 30s due to the “painterly” depiction of the rocks and water, as well as modern elements such as the low horizon (cf. Klaus Ertz's expertise of 2006).
This work reflects the Netherlandish interest in mountainous landscapes during the 16th and 17th century. These paintings were a way for people in the Netherlands to see landscapes quite unlike any of those in their home country, but which many had heard about and which were symbolic of all that was foreign, unknown and dangerous. Apart from merchants, artists were one of the few privileged groups able to see such landscapes in person, for example when crossing the Alps on the way to Italy. The perils of travel on the crude roads and wilderness of such regions were often referenced in paintings such as the present work. The church by the road in the left mid ground of the work gives a clue as to this work's identity as a “southern” landscape.
Josse de Momper is among the most important representatives of Dutch landscape painting. He began his career in the second half of the 16th century, at the time when an independent Flemish school of landscape painting was establishing itself in the wake of Pieter Brueghel the Elder. De Momper was active in Antwerp, the artistic centre of Flanders, and worked with the leading artists of his time such as Jan Brueghel the Elder, Hendrick van Balen, Sebastian Vrancx and Frans Francken the Younger.