Adriaen van der Cabel’s etching. “Landscape with a cluster of trees”, c.1680

Adriaen van der Cabel (aka Adriaen van der Kabel) (1631–1705)

“Landscape with a cluster of trees” (Le bouquet d’arbres au milieu du sujet) (aka “Landscape with resting couple along path”, c.1680 (1648–1705), from the series, “Landscapes II”, published by Nicolas Robert (fl. c.1650–1700), privilege by Lodewijk XIV (King of France)

Etching on laid paper with small margins.

Size: (sheet) 17.2 x 25.3 cm; (plate) 15.4 x 23.4 cm: (image borderline) 14.5 x 22.6 cm

Lettered below the image borderline: (left) “Adr. Bander Cabel. In[v]. et fecit Cum pri[v]il. Regis.”; (right) “ N. Bob. ex Cū P. R.”

TIB 5 (4). 15 (235) (Walter L Strauss Ed. 1979, “The Illustrated Bartsch”, vol. 5, p. 226)

The Rijksmuseum offers the following description of this print:

“Landscape with winding path where are resting a man and woman in a group of trees. In the background a view of different cities.” (http://hdl.handle.net/10934/RM0001.collect.90026)

Condition: well-inked and crisp impression with margins (approx. 1 cm) in near pristine condition.

I am selling this museum-quality etching for the total cost of AU$275 (currently US$209.76/EUR196.87/GBP167.28 at the time of this listing) including postage and handling to anywhere in the world.

If you are interested in purchasing this small but luminous print, please contact me (oz_jim@printsandprinciples.com) and I will send you a PayPal invoice to make the payment easy.

This print has been sold

Van der Cabel was born in Rijswijk (the Netherlands) but his fame rests with images like this of very Italianate scenes. In his lifetime, the artist was an influential force in the arts as his studio was, as Clifford S Ackley (1981) in “Printmaking in the Age of Rembrandt” points out, “a frequent stopping place for Dutch artists making the Italian journey” (p. 293). Sadly, the gate-keepers of history are unforgiving to artists who stray from their home soil and Van der Cabel’s status as an expatriate meant that his work could not be conveniently classified as Dutch, Italian or even Italianated Dutch. Fortunately, times have changed and need to “pigeon-hole” artists is less of a challenge for arts writers.

What I love about Van der Cabel’s work is not so much his choice of subject—usually, broad vistas populated with classical dressed figures like this etching—or even his compositions—usually a view into the distance framed between trees on either side— but rather his free use of line. To my eyes this openness of his linework and the confidence of the artist to leave lines without too many calculated refinements (e.g. the use of cross-hatching consciously designed give tonal complexity to dark areas and lines that show deliberate adjustments within the stroke by the addition of dots and other marks) creates the visual effect that the print has light glowing from within it.