Support The copper plate, approx. 0.1 cm thick, was prepared with fine parallel sanding grooves (visible at areas of paint loss), in order to facilitate the adhesion of ground and paint layers. Hammer and rolling marks are visible on the reverse.
Preparatory layers The single, warm light brown ground extends up to the edges of the support. It consists of a beige matrix with a small addition of black and red pigment particles.
Underdrawing Infrared reflectography revealed an extensive sketchy underdrawing in what appears to be a dry medium, broadly delineating the landscape, placement of the figures and ruin. Coarse parallel hatching was used to indicate the positioning of the dark rocks in the lower left corner.
Paint layers Due to the poor condition it is difficult to assess the build-up of the painting. The paint extends up to the edges of the support. The landscape was composed of different shades of smooth brown paints. The sky was indicated with a thick, smoothly applied, white and light grey paint. Medium rich, slightly translucent unctuous paint was used for the trees, bushes, branches and leaves that continue over the sky. The detailing of these plants is rather fine, as well as of the light coloured small branches and leaves underneath the pedestal, which were executed with small delicate lines and dots of paint. The figures appear to be added over the finished landscape. The highlighted areas of the ruin show some slight impasto.
Ige Verslype, 2022

Poor. Small deformations of the plate are visible throughout. The reverse has corroded considerably, mostly so in the upper part. There are extensive paint losses throughout, especially in the left background, due to corrosion. The varnish is uneven and has yellowed severely. A distinct crack pattern is visible in the standing figure, below the seated figure in the centre and in the sky just above the horizon, probably caused by mechanical impact.

…; collection Nieuwe Zijds Huiszittenhuis, Prinsengracht, Amsterdam;¹¹According to a label on the reverse; see Inscriptions. transferred to the Workhouse, Roetersstraat, Amsterdam, 1 June 1873;²²According to a label on the reverse; see Inscriptions. on loan from the City of Amsterdam to the museum since 1885

Object number: SK-C-452

Credit line: On loan from the City of Amsterdam

When this interior of a cave, executed on copper, entered the Rijksmuseum it was already in a very damaged state due to corrosion.⁵⁵See Condition. The signature ‘petrus.van. hattich / 16[..]’ is well preserved, however, with the exception of the last two digits of the year. It was read as ‘1646’ when the picture was transferred to the museum,⁶⁶Note RMA. but the third numeral could also be a five; the last one is now totally illegible. The painting cannot be dated from a comparison with other works by Petrus van Hattich.

The scene gives evidence of the artist’s typical manner. The antique ruins are detailed with subdued highlights against a sketchy repoussoir. The foliage is depicted with a very delicate touch. A similar technique can be seen in two of Van Hattich’s cave entrances: Landscape with a Cave in the Hermitage in St Petersburg,⁷⁷Illustrated in W. Bernt, Die niederländischen Maler des 17. Jahrhunderts, IV, Munich 1948, no. 121. and a painting in the Musée Massey in Tarbes.⁸⁸Photo RKD.

In addition to the three nymphs disporting themselves amidst the ruins, two more ghostly female forms who appear to be bathing can be glimpsed through the reedy vegetation at bottom right. A painting attributed to the Utrecht artist Abraham van Cuylenborch, Nymphs Bathing in a Cave,⁹⁹Present whereabouts unknown; illustrated in the catalogue for the sale, Jean-Marc Delvaux, Paris (Drouot Richelieu), 28 June 2002, no. 58. is close to the present scene not only in subject but also in its almost identical composition. There are often quartets of similar wraithlike nymphs bathing in the different versions of Van Cuylenborch’s picture. The Rijksmuseum work may originally have had more of them that have been lost through its poor condition. Van Hattich probably also looked at the repertoire of Carel de Hooch, another Utrecht artist who produced interiors of caves with classical ruins. His View of a Cave with a Bust of Seneca by a Tomb contains a similar view through to a distant background with ruins.¹⁰¹⁰Present whereabouts unknown; photo RKD.

Anne Lenders, 2022

See Key to abbreviations, Rijksmuseum painting catalogues and Acknowledgements

1903, p. 118, no. 1113; 1976, p. 261, no. C 452

Anne Lenders, 2022, 'Petrus van Hattich, Nymphs in a Cave with Antique Ruins, c. 1645 - c. 1655', in J. Bikker (ed.), Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth Century in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: https://data.rijksmuseum.nl/20028008