Landscape with horses, sheep and cows - Roelandt Savery (1576-1639)

ROELANDT SAVERY
1576 - 1639
“Landscape with horses, sheep, cows and herdsmen”
Oil on copper
Signed and dated.
Dimensions: 25 x 34 cm, 34 x 44 cm (framed)

THE ARTIST
Roelandt Savery was born in Kortrijk in 1576 and died in Utrecht in 1639. He was a Flemish-born Dutch painter, engraver, and draughtsman. His Protestant parents fled the Spanish Netherlands for religious reasons after the capture of Kortrijk by the malcontenten and settled around 1585 in Haarlem. Savery came from a family of artists and received his artistic training from his older brother, Jacob Maertensz Savery, in Amsterdam.

After his training, Savery travelled to Prague, where he is first mentioned in 1604. There he worked as court painter to the Holy Roman Emperors Rudolf II and Matthias. Their court was an important center of Mannerist art, and the imperial collections of living and stuffed animals, fossils, and rare stones strongly influenced Savery’s work, especially his development as an animal painter. No other artist depicted the now-extinct dodo as frequently as Savery.

Savery also travelled to Tyrol to study plants. In 1607 and 1608, Emperor Rudolf II sent him to the Tyrolean Alps to observe and draw nature. In 1616 he returned to Amsterdam, and in 1618 he settled permanently in Utrecht, joining the Guild of Saint Luke shortly thereafter.

Throughout his life, Savery mainly painted landscapes in the Flemish tradition of Gillis van Coninxloo, often populated with numerous carefully rendered animals and plants. These landscapes sometimes include mythological or biblical themes. In addition, he painted flower still lifes and is regarded as a pioneer of the genre; the earliest known painted flower still life by a Dutch artist, dating from 1603, is attributed to him.

Savery developed a highly personal style related to the prevailing Mannerism of his time. His work was extremely popular among collectors and is now held in major museums such as the Rijksmuseum, the Mauritshuis, and the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna. His drawings are also highly valued. His reputation during his lifetime is reflected in the words of Karel van Mander, who praised him as a pupil of Hans Bol and noted his mastery in both work and art.

THE ARTWORK
Landscape painting flourished in the Netherlands during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. While in the sixteenth century landscapes often functioned as a background, in the seventeenth century they became an independent subject. Carriage in a Landscape is a clear example of this development and reflects Savery’s lifelong interest in nature.

The painting presents a light-filled, expansive landscape populated with people and animals. In the foreground, a carriage and a man are shown together with animals such as horses and cows, demonstrating Savery’s particular skill in depicting animals. The composition includes many trees, some with gnarled trunks that resemble human figures, a detail Savery frequently used. A view opens toward a lower-lying area of nature in the distance, creating depth and spatial clarity.

A striking blue sky dominates the upper part of the painting, a characteristic element of Savery’s landscapes. The careful rendering of animals, plants, and landscape details gives the scene a vivid and natural appearance. Both Savery’s drawings and paintings often appear as if they were taken directly from nature, as though he painted exactly what he observed.

The work demonstrates Savery’s ability to combine detailed observation with a personal and imaginative vision of the natural world, resulting in a richly animated and convincing landscape.