Canal with a large Boat and a Bridge ('Het Schuytje op de voorgrondt')

This small and exquisite landscape has often been understood as the pendant of another small etching of the same year, Canal with an Angler and two Swans (NH 253), on the basis of the very similar size, style and the rounded platemark above. It has even been speculated that the two plates were once one long plate, which had subsequently been separated by Rembrandt, but this theory has gradually lost support.
The typical Dutch motif of the boat moored in a canal is enriched with a rocky landscape in the left background and other picturesque elements. The present example is a very fine, warm impression with much burr, of the second state. Of the first state, only six impressions are recorded.