Greenwich, 1849, no. 9. London, Royal Academy, Winter Exhibition , 1889, no. 122. London, Burlington Fine Arts Club, 1900, no. 40. Winchester, 1938. London, Royal Academy, Winter Exhibition , 1950-51, no. 369, and 1952, no. 55. London, Thomas Agnew & Son, Ltd., June-July 1957, no. 15.
Provenance
(Possibly) Roothaan collection, Amsterdam; sale, De Vries, Amsterdam, 29 March 1826, lot 22, 'Een uitgestrekt til Watergezigt, met een groot aantal zeilende en drijvende vaartnigen; op deu voorgrond, langs eene strook van het strand, is eene visschers schuit met twee visschers. De avondtoon van de lucht en het water maken dit schilderij zeer aangenaam en tot een uitmuntend kunststuk' (1,050 florins to Hulsuit). with John Smith, London, by whom sold in 1847 to Sir Thomas Baring, 2nd Bt. (1772-1848), London, and by descent through his eldest son Sir Francis Baring, 3rd Bt, subsequently 1st Baron Northbrook (1796-1866), to The Earls of Northbrook (cat. 1889, no. 116). Acquired by the present owner in 2001.
Notes
THE PROPERTY OF DR ALFRED R. BADER, MILWAUKEE, WISCONSIN
VAT rate of 5% is payable on hammer price and at 17.5% on the buyer's premium. The Dutch Republic's wealth in the seventeenth century depended on its dominance of the seas and its success in trade, described by an English contemporary as 'so far extended that it may be said to have no other bounds than those which the Almighty set at Creation' (D. Coombs, The conduct of the Dutch , …The Hague, 1958, p. 6). Shipping was at the heart of the Dutch economy from the emergence of the Republic as a separate entity from Spain through to the end of the seventeenth century. The genre of marine painting developed alongside the new state with the works of the first specialized marine painter, Hendrik Cornelisz. Vroom (1566-1640) in the 1590s. He documented specific battles and celebratory parades and, as an internationally recognized painter, was well compensated for his work. Over the course of the century naval commanders became popular heroes and the genre of marine painting developed further with the works of Willem van de Velde, Simon de Vlieger and Jan van de Cappelle. In addition to being studies of atmosphere and light, paintings such as A Calm Sea with Ships near the Shore carried significant symbolic and even patriotic weight.
Jan van de Cappelle is known for exquisite marine scenes such as A Calm Sea with Ships near the Shore . Unlike van de Velde or de Vlieger, van de Cappelle's body of work is relatively small and only ten of his known works are dated. This painting, in the Northbrook collection from the mid-nineteenth through to the end of the twentieth century, was painted during van de Cappelle's most active period, the early 1650s, and depicts one of his favorite subjects, boats in calm water beneath an expansive sky. Van de Cappelle has constructed his composition around two focal points, the group of boats to the right of centre and those at the far left. Distant vistas open out between them, a city in the far distance on the right and the horizon dotted with sails on the left. The recession of space is indicated through the diminishing scale of the boats that become nothing more than small vertical touches of yellow ochre on the horizon. The warm tonality of the sails contrasts with the cool grey-blue of the sky, their sculptural, almost planar appearance catching the light like a many faceted object. The dark clouds are reflected on the surface of the water in the foreground and a man with a basket on his back wades towards the small boat, the minor disturbance of the water indicated by his broken reflection.
Shipping in a calm at Flushing with a States General Yacht firing a salute (J. Paul Getty Museum; fig. 1) of 1649 has a similarly divided composition that revolves around two groupings of vessels in two lines of sight. As with A Calm Sea with Ships near the Shore , van de Cappelle frames the scene to enhance the sense of its continuity beyond the limitations of the picture space. The abrupt termination of the composition on one side is a device that he also used in works in Vienna (Kunsthistorisches Museum) and London (National Gallery). Another early work, A kaag and a smaak in a calm (sold in the Rooms, 8 July 2005, lot 33 for £3,592,000; fig. 2), has a notably simpler composition than either the Getty or the Northbrook painting and reveals the influence of Simon de Vlieger, who may have been van de Cappelle's teacher.
More is known about Jan van de Cappelle's development as an artist from his inventory of 1680 than through documents related to training or commissions. He never joined the Amsterdam St. Luke's Guild and was already described as a self-taught painter during his lifetime by his friend and fellow artist Gerbrand van den Eeckhout. It has been suggested that Simon de Vlieger was a teacher in some capacity and the presence of 1300 drawings by the artist in van de Cappelle's collection indicates both that he knew the older artist's work well and that he held it in high esteem. Two paintings described as copies by van de Cappelle of works by de Vlieger and Jan Porcellis further suggest that he used the exercise of copying, a long standing and common studio assignment, to teach himself. Van de Cappelle also owned 400 drawings by Jan van Goyen and 500 drawings and 6 paintings by Rembrandt, who also painted his portrait (now lost), and 86 drawings by the landscape painter Willem Buytewech. In total he owned over 200 paintings and 6,000 drawings, all bought with the fortune he inherited in 1674 with his father's dyeworks in Amsterdam.
Van de Cappelle is also known to have had a pleasure yacht and certain of his drawings suggest that he used it to make studies from life. His interest in the everyday workings of life on the water is revealed in his studies of men at work in varying capacities and his detailed drawings reveal his fascination with the way sails are made and how they work. His interest is reflected in the paintings in his depiction of sails at various stages of use and such observations not only provide visual variation but also the impression of a specific time and place. The length of canvas used as a roof for the small boat in the foreground, for example, can be seen on a more elaborate scale in a drawing of a barge with soldiers (Berlin, Kupferstichkabinett). Van de Cappelle's technical interest in certain of his drawings gives way to the beauty of the whole in his paintings. In works such as A Calm Sea with Ships near the Shore , the masts and riggings are all movement and light, catching the wind from various angles and stretching into the far distance.
