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The boats crowded together on either side of Jan van de Cappelle’s painting are tough, working craft, made to carry goods and people along the coastline and the many waterways of Holland. Although the vessels are not glamorous in themselves, van de Cappelle has exaggerated the height of the masts and bathed the graceful folds of sails in warm sunlight to give the image its majesty. Its haunting quality comes from the stillness, the soft, muted colours and the luminous reflections. The artist has almost hidden the vessels themselves in shadow, but they are crowded with incident and activity for the patient eye to find. Like other marine artists of the time, van de Cappelle painted incidents, characters and objects that might be unfamiliar to a modern audience but which would have been understood instantly by a contemporary one.
Title
A River Scene with a Large Ferry and Numerous Dutch Vessels at Anchor
Date
about 1665
Medium
Oil on canvas
Measurements
H 122 x W 154.5 cm
Accession number
NG967
Acquisition method
Wynn Ellis Bequest, 1876
Work type
Painting
The National Gallery, London
Trafalgar Square, London, Greater London WC2N 5DN England
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