Johnny Van Haeften Limited, London, 2003, Dutch and Flemish Old Master Paintings, Catalogue Thirteen,
no. 30. 

Painted in the 1650s

Aert van der Neer specialised in scenes such as A moonlit village, a study of atmosphere, light, and time that appeals in its momentary quality to modern sensibilities.  This scene takes place at night, after the shops and taverns have closed and the activity that fills the day has all but ceased.  Two men in a boat at the centre of the composition are the only figures that animate the scene, made lively largely through Van der Neer’s observation of moonlight and its effect on the surroundings.  His limited palette emphasises the quality of the light, emanating from the moon behind the trees at the right and casting a dusky hue on the buildings below.  It falls on the windows of the house and the church at the left, creating bright reflections that enliven the left side of the composition and balance the brightness of the moon.  The viewer’s eye is inevitably drawn to the most colourful passage in the painting —the salmon pink, hazy blue and bright white of the night sky against which the rooftops and leafless trees appear in near silhouette.

Van der Neer’s earliest works are genre scenes and landscapes in the style of Gillis de Hondecoeter (c. 1575/80-1638) and Roelandt Savery (1576-1639) but, by the mid 1640’s, he had begun to specialise in winter scenes and moonlit river views.[i]  Van der Neer constructed the majority of his compositions around a central body of water that, as in A moonlit village, often stretches the entire width of the foreground, giving the composition depth through its articulation of receding space.  His scenes are almost always seen from a raised vantage point and are largely imaginary, with the exception of works such as Moonlit landscape with castle (1646, Jerusalem, Israel Museum), which includes the famous and often depicted ruins of Kostverloren on the Amstel.  A moonlit village, dated in the 1650’s,is smaller than many of Van der Neer’s paintings, making for a more intimate scene, and its panel support emphasises the range and quality of Van der Neer’s brushwork.[ii]

BIOGRAPHY

According to biographer Arnold Houbraken, Aert van der Neer spent his youth in a town near Gorinchem, where he worked as a steward for the lords of Arkel.[iii] Although nothing of his artistic training is known, he may have become a painter through the influence of the Camphuyzen brothers, Rafael (1597/98-1657) and Jochem (1601/02-59).[iv]  A landscape dated 1633 is signed by both Van der Neer and Jochem Camphuyzen and he is thought to have married their sister, Lysbeth Govaertsdr. Rafael Camphuyzen served as a witness at the baptism of their daughter, Cornelia, in 1642.  The couple moved to Amsterdam in 1632, where their eldest son, genre and portrait painter Eglon, was born around 1634. In 1659 and again in 1662 Van der Neer is documented as being the keeper of a tavern on the Kalverstraat, but on 12 December 1662 he declared bankruptcy.  His property and paintings were appraised and given little value.  He continued to paint, however, living in humble circumstances on the Kerkstraat, near the Leidsegracht, until his death in 1677.

Dr. Meredith M. Hale