The Origins of Dutch Landscape Art

While Visscher’s prints gained popularity and inspired other artists to publish works depicting the Haarlem surroundings, they did not mark the beginning of the landscape genre. Its origins are in Antwerp. In 1559 and 1561, Hieronymus Cock, an Antwerp publisher, issued two sets of small prints illustrating the rural scenery around the city. The title page of Cock’s landscape series indicates that the scenes were created “ad vivum” — from life.⁷ The prints mainly focus on the landscape, fields, houses or farmsteads, with very few people depicted. Consequently, they do not portray the ‘real life’ of a workday, with people going about their routines, but instead highlight the calm, static tranquillity of a Sunday.⁸

The southern Low Countries, particularly the wealthy city of Antwerp, had a lively art scene, with a society that valued spending money on art to decorate their homes. Artists produced large numbers of paintings and prints featuring domestic scenes, landscapes or still lifes. The price range of these artworks varied from affordable to expensive, making them accessible not only to the wealthy.

Following the Dutch revolt, the sack of Antwerp in 1576 and the increasing Spanish suppression of Dutch Protestants, many people fled to the northern provinces. Among them were wealthy merchants, artisans, draftsmen, printmakers and painters. The immigrants from the Spanish Netherlands brought with them a substantial collection of paintings and prints to the north. Among them were most likely Hieronymus Cock’s prints, which had been republished in 1601.⁹

The influx was so substantial that local artists in cities such as Amsterdam, Haarlem and Leiden saw their livelihoods threatened. In the northern Dutch provinces, many artists continued to depend on patronage, producing high-priced paintings for select clients.¹⁰ These artists complained, demanding that their guilds introduce restrictions on the sale of imported art. While some restrictions were put in place, they had little effect.¹¹

A major reason for the sudden surge of interest in art, especially landscapes, was the republication of Hieronymus Cock’s landscape prints by Claes Jansz. Visscher in 1611/12. Visscher started his publishing business in 1605 and built a collection of prints by purchasing many plates from other publishers. Buying used plates or copying them was common at the time.¹³ In this way, Visscher also tried to acquire the printing plates for Cock’s landscape series, and after failing, he copied twenty-six of the forty-four views.¹⁴

Visscher deliberately focused on the landscape prints of Antwerp’s surroundings. As a shrewd businessman, he would not have gone to the trouble of reworking the plates without a clear market in mind. One potential group of buyers could have been the many people who emigrated from Brabant to the Dutch Republic. On the title page, Visscher credited the series to Pieter Bruegel, a well-known Antwerp artist. This misattribution may have been intentional, aimed at the immigrant market to increase sales.¹⁵

Republishing Cock’s series in 1612 may have inspired Visscher to issue some of his own drawings. A notable difference between Cock’s original series and Visscher’s re-publication, as well as between the older and younger generations of printmakers and publishers, was the technique used. Older publishers engraved their prints on copper plates, while Visscher and other young printmakers employed etching techniques.¹⁶

Engraving involved cutting images into the surface of the printing plate with sharp tools and physical strength. In contrast, etching employed chemicals; the images were burned onto the plate with acid. Etching offered several advantages: it required no special training, was more cost-effective, involved less labour and was quicker. Additionally, etching produced softer lines on the plate, making it more suitable for capturing the atmospheric qualities of landscapes.

Visscher established himself as one of the leading publishers of landscape prints. His efforts resonated not only with consumers but also with artists. In part, Visscher envisioned his prints as sources of inspiration and workshop models.¹⁷

After Visscher published his collection of Pleasant Places, landscapes quickly became a very popular subject for drawings and paintings. The images featured a wide range of motifs. Some depict farmsteads and villages, while others display maritime scenes, such as boats sailing on Dutch canals or dunes along the shoreline. Domestic scenes and people are often included, such as carts or boats with passengers, people bringing in the harvest, or travellers on the road. The new genre had captured the public’s imagination.

However, the interest in and success of landscape art were not solely due to its novelty. The context of the Eighty Years’ War has to be considered. The newly established Dutch Republic needed to forge its own political and cultural identity. Images of the Dutch landscape, its villages and towns, its charming and pleasant places, as well as locations that reminded people of their daily struggles, helped unify the population around the idea of what it meant to be Dutch.

For anyone interested, the digital collection of the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam is a treasure trove of landscape sketches, drawings and paintings from that period. The majority of exhibits are in the public domain and are a significant source for illustrating Samuel Kiechel’s journey.