Support The single, horizontally grained oak plank is approx. 0.6 cm thick. The top edge has probably been trimmed. The reverse is bevelled on all sides, although only slightly at the top, and has regularly spaced saw marks. A wooden strip (approx. 6.3 cm) was added to the top at a later date and was at some point detached again, leaving half dovetails near the upper corners. Dendrochronology has shown that the youngest heartwood ring was formed in 1642. The panel could have been ready for use by 1651, but a date in or after 1661 is more likely.
Preparatory layers Due to the poor condition of the painting it is difficult to assess the build-up of the preparatory layers. The ground appears to extend up to the edges of the support and to consist of two layers: the first being white to off-white and primarily filling the grain of the wood, the second being beige. The ground seems identical to the one found on SK-A-290 and SK-A-3329.
Underdrawing Infrared reflectography revealed a loose underdrawing in a liquid medium (also partly visible with infrared photography) consisting of several broad, dark forms roughly indicating compositional elements. The flat shapes of the figures, executed in black paint with no added shading or detailing, are likely to have been applied in this stage.
Paint layers Due to extensive compositional changes and the poor condition it is difficult to assess the build-up of the painting. The paint appears to extend up to the edges of the support. The sky and ice were blocked in first with grey, followed by the landscape. More details and impasto were gradually added next. Numerous changes were made at various stages. Infrared images clearly reveal that the trees, for example, were first planned as having no leaves, and that the configuration of buildings to the right of the church tower was altered (also faintly visible to the naked eye). Moreover, it seems that an initial winter view was converted into a hunting scene quite early on; the flat shapes of the figures originally planned on the ice appear to have been left at a preliminary stage.
Lisette Vos, 2022

Poor. It appears that the composition of Landscape with Hunter was once partially removed to reveal the underlying, probably unfinished Winter Landscape, after which the picture was overpainted to close it again. That intervention, in turn, was partially undone during the 1988-92 treatment, making the underlying winter scene more apparent and revealing the damaged bare wood of the plank on the left.

…; from the dealer John Smith, London, £100, to Adriaan van der Hoop (1778-1854), Amsterdam, 2 July 1833;¹¹Lijst van schilderijen, beelden en teekeningen van Adriaan van der Hoop te Amsterdam, NHA, ARS, no. 388 (copy in Rijksmuseum Research Library), p. 4, no. 59: ‘Landschap door A: vander Neer. In London gekocht van John Smith voor £100….[fl. 1,200]’. London, National Art Library (Victoria and Albert Museum), Special Collections, 88 CC 12, Smith and Successors Stock Book 1822-50, no. 796. by whom bequeathed to the City of Amsterdam, with 223 other paintings, 1854;²²Taxatie van schilderijen, teekeningen en beeldhouwwerken gedaan door Pieter E.H. Praetorius en Gerrit de Vries Jz., executeuren van het testament van A. van der Hoop […] 29 april 1854, NHA, ARS, no. 388 (copy in Rijksmuseum Research Library), p. 2, no. 59: ‘Boomryk Landschap met verder stoffage, fl. 100’. on loan from the City of Amsterdam to the museum since 30 June 1885³³Provenance reconstructed in A. Pollmer, ‘Catalogus van de schilderijen in de verzameling van Adriaan van der Hoop’, in E. Bergvelt et al., De Hollandse meesters van een Amsterdamse bankier: De verzameling van Adriaan van der Hoop (1778-1854), exh. cat. Amsterdam (Amsterdams Historisch Museum; Rijksmuseum) 2004-05, pp. 135-95, esp. p. 165, no. 123.

Object number: SK-C-192

Credit line: On loan from the City of Amsterdam (A. van der Hoop Bequest)

Since the nineteenth century this Wooded Landscape with Hunter has been rated as one of the most important early paintings by Aert van der Neer.¹⁰¹⁰A. Bredius, ‘Aernout (Aert) van der Neer’, Oud Holland 18 (1900), pp. 69-82, esp. p. 69. The scene, as it appeared at the time, was of a wood and a pond with a view through the trees to a church, and with a hunter in the foreground (fig. a). Bachmann dated it around 1642,¹¹¹¹As does W. Schulz, Aert van der Neer, Doornspijk 2002, p. 38. and compared it to Pond in Front of a Village, which was thought to come from the same year but which is now known to have been executed after 1645.¹²¹²F. Bachmann, Aert van der Neer 1603/4-1677, Bremen 1982, pp. 38-40. Frankfurt, Städel Museum; illustrated in W. Schulz, Aert van der Neer, Doornspijk 2002, col. pl. 31. It is now assumed that the signature is fake and dendrochronological examination has shown that the picture could not have been made before 1645; see L. Krempel, Holländische Gemälde im Städel 1550-1800, II: Künstler geboren 1615 bis 1630, coll. cat. Frankfurt (Städelsches Kunstinstitut und Städtische Galerie) 2005, pp. 266-73. That was also one of the few of the artist’s compositions to include a hunter.¹³¹³One other is Evening Landscape, Carcassonne, Musée des Beaux-Arts; illustrated in W. Schulz, Aert van der Neer, Doornspijk 2002, pl. 152. An early example of a similar wooded landscape with a pond, which was probably made shortly after 1635, is Bank of a River with Trees and an Angler, present whereabouts unknown; illustrated in ibid., pl. 78. The problematic aspects of the present picture, such as the clumsy rendering of the hunter, the lack of a target for him and the overpainting in the sky and trees on the left, were not immediately noticed and the autograph nature of the work was never doubted, nor did the strip 6.3 cm high that had clearly been added to the top of the panel raise questions.¹⁴¹⁴The fact that a strip had been added was mentioned as early as 1903; B.W.F. van Riemsdijk, Catalogus der schilderijen, miniaturen, pastels, omlijste teekeningen, enz. in het Rijks-Museum te Amsterdam, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1903, p. 191, no. 1721.

It is no longer possible to reconstruct precisely how, why and when reservations began to be expressed about large areas of the work.¹⁵¹⁵See also Technical notes. As the 1976 collection catalogue shows the painting without the extension at the top, the extra strip had probably been detached by then.¹⁶¹⁶P.J.J. van Thiel et al., All the Paintings of the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam: A Completely Illustrated Catalogue, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1976, p. 410, no. C 192. It had certainly been removed by 1978, when X-rays were taken.¹⁷¹⁷See Scientific examination and reports. In 1988-92 part of the overpainting of the sky and the trees on the left, which originally extended onto the added strip, was removed. Photographs taken at the time show that the pond had now become transparent to such an extent that the silhouettes of small figures underneath it must have been visible to the naked eye (fig. b). The cleaning had several consequences. On the one hand it became clear that most of the left-hand part of the picture did not match Van der Neer’s initial design. The tree in the foreground was previously shorter and another on the left much taller, they had no leaves, and silhouettes of skaters rather than the hunter were included. On the other hand, the wood of the panel was now revealed. In other words, a winter landscape had been discovered, but there was so little of it left that it could not possibly serve as the basis for a new scene. An attempt was made to reverse the cleaning but was eventually abandoned.

The one thing that is certain is that the panel was originally used for a winter landscape. The left half of the composition consisted of a stretch of frozen water surrounded by a strip of land, woods and the houses of a village. A simple church could be seen between the bare trunks of the trees in the left background. On the ice were skaters, some of them with sledges, and a few people playing kolf. The scale of the figures and their activities closely resemble those in other winter landscape by Van der Neer from the period 1642-43.¹⁸¹⁸One very comparable work is Winter Scene on an Extensive Frozen Water of 1642, present whereabouts unknown; illustrated in W. Schulz, Aert van der Neer, Doornspijk 2002, pl. 5. It is very possible that the church between the trees on the right was part of the initial design,¹⁹¹⁹In Winter Scene on an Extensive Frozen Water (see previous note) there is also a building on a slight elevation seen through the trees. as quite a few changes were made to it. The trees on the right, or at least some of them, certainly were originally planned. It seems likely that Van der Neer left the picture unfinished and decided at an early stage to use the panel for another scene.

Regardless of the fact whether Van der Neer himself had a hand in the compositional adaptations or another artist, the initial design was changed before 1833, when Adriaen van der Hoop bought the picture as a ‘Landscape by A. van der Neer’.²⁰²⁰See Provenance. The sheet of frozen water became a pond in a wood, the skaters were overpainted, the trees had sprouted leaves, and the buildings around the ice were covered with trees. Only the small house in the centre of the scene was spared, although it was tucked away a bit by making the stump of the dead tree in the foreground taller.

Erlend de Groot, 2022

See Key to abbreviations, Rijksmuseum painting catalogues and Acknowledgements

C. Hofstede de Groot, Beschreibendes und kritisches Verzeichnis der Werke der hervorragendsten holländischen Maler des XVII. Jahrhunderts, VII, Esslingen/Paris 1918, pp. 367-68, no. 19; F. Bachmann, Aert van der Neer 1603/4-1677, Bremen 1982, pp. 39-40; W. Schulz, Aert van der Neer, Doornspijk 2002, pp. 194-95, no. 248

1887, p. 121, no. 1017; 1903, p. 191, no. 1721; 1934, p. 206, no. 1721; 1960, p. 224, no. 1721; 1976, p. 410, no. C 192

Erlend de Groot, 2022, 'Aert van der Neer, Wooded Landscape with Hunter/Winter Landscape, c. 1642 - 1643', in J. Bikker (ed.), Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth Century in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: https://data.rijksmuseum.nl/20029044