Lot 2533 Dα

Barend Cornelis Koekkoek settled in the town of Cleve in the Lower Rhine Region in 1834. He was one of the leading Romantic landscape painters of his era, and the present small-format work is a typical example of his compositional style, colour palette, and brushwork. It depicts a peasant family praying before a roadside shrine whilst a pack donkey waits patiently beside a babbling brook leading into the foreground of the work. The low sun illuminates parts of the scene, rendering others in shadow.
Friedrich Gorissen, author of the artist's catalogue raisonné, did not know this painting either in the original or as a photograph, and simply included the piece among the list of Koekkoek's “undated landscapes”. However, Gorissen quotes two descriptions from an auction catalogue and publication from the year 1863 that correspond so closely to the present work in both dimensions and details that there is no doubt as to this being one and the same piece. This new discovery represents a fascinating enrichment to the artist's œuvre.
Dr. Guido de Werd has confirmed this work to be an original product of Barend Cornelis Koekkoek upon examination of the original. He will be including the piece in his forthcoming revised catalogue raisonné under the no. 48/25,5.