Cornelis De Wael

(Anversa, 1592 - Roma, 1667)

This painting should be included in the corpus of "maniera grande" works by the painter Cornelis de Wael. We can define this landscape as a vedutism, similar to several other works in the same genre: View of a Port with a Galley and Dutch Sailing Ships, up for auction at Pandolfini, Florence, November 14, 2017; Scene de derbarquement sur un rivale Mediterranean - Acturial, Paris, February 12, 2025.

Although we find no signature of the artist, if we observe the half-length figure portrayed on the wall beneath the tower, we might assume that the artist intended to make a cameo of himself, given the character's absolute resemblance to the image in Anton Van Dyck's painting of Lucas and Cornelis. It seems as if the painter is observing from above, constructing with his brush a theatrical scene whose scenographic structure lends it a real, naturalistic quality. The painter, from above, is capturing a minute and lively episode, captured and photographed in the port setting, with a teeming vivacity of moving figures.

capturing the essence of port life. The figures are depicted with great variety and movement, contributing to the liveliness of the composition.

It conveys and constructs a narrative of a realistic environment, a spatial and free-flowing space, whose chromatic nature is softened by a vivid luminism: the sky, though dark and threatening, is touched by a pink hue that makes the light clear and brilliant. The hazy sea air in the distance expands to the horizon in an atmospheric realism. The work demonstrates the unmistakable characteristics of our artistry, starting with the compositional scheme, which is always similar in seaports: promontories and the dock in the foreground, always billowing and billowing clouds in the sky, and various characters on the dock, including some Orientals wearing Turkish headdresses, painted with a chromatic punctuation of their robes with touches of red, blue, white, and yellow. The inclusion of classical elements, such as the two towers with fortified walls, a distant castle in the background, and the monument of Neptune on the dock, are often timely characterizations in all his paintings. Due to the numerous commissions, his workshop was organised like a real business, staffed by numerous collaborators.

Indeed, the very precise and detailed manner in which the boats are depicted suggests the intervention of Andreas van Ertvelt. The painting is a fine example of the great technical skill of the Flemish painter Cornelis De Wael, a forerunner of the landscape painters of the following century.

ASOR Studio