Dutch artists dominated the genre of landscape painting in the seventeenth century, and Dutch Landscapes brings together more than one hundred lavish color images of their beautiful paintings, which remain popular with art lovers and museum-goers today.
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The volume is dominated by stunning evocations of the landscape of Holland—its manmade lowlands and richly foreboding skies—populated with peasants at their labors and aristocrats riding off to the hunt. But Dutch artists didn’t limit themselves to views of their homeland: they also ventured to Italy, where the wildly different landscape inspired new approaches and themes, from Arcadian wilderness to the lively activity of the Roman streetscape. And then there was the sea—the source of the Netherlands’ prosperity—which painters captured in all its drama and power.
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Desmond Shawe-Taylor’s accessible notes to each picture link the paintings and explore their relationships, their shared approaches, and their many innovations; the result is a book that brings to life the Dutch Golden Age in all its glory.