Lot 57 Dα

This work is registered with the RKD in The Hague under the no. 110626 as a work of Gillis Neyts (with erroneous dimensions).<BR>The landscape painter and draughtsman Gillis Neyts from Brabant was primarily active in Antwerp and Namur. Although documents record a sojourn to Spain, it is unlikely that the artist ever visited Italy, despite the appearance of some Italiante works within his oeuvre. Neyts' spacious landscapes, painted in shades of green, brown, and yellow, follow the Flemish landscape tradition. Most of his works depict hilly landscapes featuring castles, overgrown ruins, and towns or villages in the background. The present work combines a stout, fortified round tower in the left foreground with a water mill in the right mid-ground and a view onto a crumbling castle structure in the background. The work is dated to 1666 and was presumably painted in Namur. Neyts was commissioned to paint a piece to hang over the fireplace of the local town hall in Namur in the same year, after being granted citizenship rights one year previously.