An extensive landscape with figures on a path in the foreground

A contemporary of Jacob van Ruisdael, Jan Wijnants rapidly established himself as one of the most significant Dutch landscape painters of the second half of the seventeenth century. Moving away from the monochromatic tones favored by earlier painters like Jan van Goyen, Wjinants suffused his views with light and color. This painting shows the increasingly pervasive influence that the Italian landscape traditions had on its Dutch counterpart, something that the artist would have been able to observe in the work of painters who had spent time in the south, like Nicolaes Berchem and Karel du Jardin. The careful rendering of the plants in the lower left foreground, however, show his consummate skill in observing nature and recall the similar care artists like Ruisdael took in the depiction of such details. Wijnants’ work remained hugely popular throughout the eighteenth century and was a source of direct inspiration on painters like Jean-Honoré Fragonard and Thomas Gainsborough.