An Architectural Fantasy, c. 1670

This painting evokes the pleasures of elegant country life. Gentle sunlight illuminates the façade of a handsome Palladian villa situated on a small rise in a park. Passing through the magnificent classical gateway, a master and his servant approach a waiting beggar woman with a child on her back. In front of the gate a man seated on a fragment of antique sculpture adjusts the collars of two sleek hunting dogs. The casual poses of the other figures—the two men who in eager discussion lean against the garden balustrade, the servant who lounges in the doorway of the villa, and the various dogs who sniff, urinate, or curl up and doze—contribute to the liveliness of the scene. Much of the painting’s appeal arises from the contrast between the easy informality of the figures and the restrained formality of the setting. Although the painting is not signed, its attribution to Jan van der Heyden is not in doubt; the broad areas of light and shadow, the minute detail, and especially the brick walls are hallmarks of his style.

While best known for his cityscapes, Van der Heyden was also the foremost Dutch painter of country houses.[1]  [1]
Helga Wagner, Jan van der Heyden, 1637–1712 (Amsterdam, 1971), lists 152 views of Dutch and foreign cities and 28 views of country palaces. His depictions of these houses and their surrounding gardens reflect the importance of country estates in Dutch culture after mid-century. By then many, if not most, wealthy city dwellers owned land in the country.[2]  [2]
Land was not only a safe investment, but on even a small plot one could raise one’s own fruit and vegetables and other household provisions. Furthermore, landholdings, from small vegetable plots to large country estates, provided retreats in nature away from the tensions of city life. Finally, landownership in itself had a certain prestige, for during earlier periods it had been the prerogative of the nobility. A number of Amsterdam burghers owned estates near the river Vecht, some of which Van der Heyden painted in the 1660s and 1670s. He also painted views of country estates in other areas, for example, Elswout outside of Haarlem, one of the grandest nonaristocratic properties in Holland [fig. 1]   [fig. 1] detail of, Jan van der Heyden, Elswout, c. 1660, oil on panel, Frans Hals Museum, Haarlem. Elswout was unusual not only for its elegance and its architectural design, but also because it was built on a high dune.[3]  [3]
Behind the house was a sunken garden carved out of the dune. In the late 1660s, Van der Heyden painted the Huis ten Bosch, a small palace outside The Hague built for Amalia van Solms, the Princess of Orange.[4]  [4]
Helga Wagner, Jan van der Heyden, 1637–1712 (Amsterdam, 1971), nos. 133–138.

The identification of the country estate in the National Gallery’s painting has long been a matter of discussion. Smith and Hofstede de Groot both considered the subject to be the Castle of Rozendaal near Arnhem, but the villa bears no resemblance to the building represented in numerous views of Rozendaal.[5]  [5]
See, for example, the anonymous pencil drawings of Het Huis Rozendaal, bij Arnhem, dated 1707, Album L3, Museum Nairac (neg. RKD Top. L. 1670 in the collection of the Afdeling Topografie of the RKD), which show the castle in its medieval state before it was remodeled in the Palladian style. Its appearance after remodeling can be seen in an engraving by Peter Schenk, pl. 9, in the collection of engravings titled Nederland, in the Dumbarton Oaks Garden Library collection. This small palace with extensive formal gardens is now destroyed, but it would have been well known in the eighteenth century. Recent scholars have rightly concluded that the scene, as is so often the case with Van der Heyden, is a fanciful construct, imaginatively created from motifs he had seen in real life and from printed architectural sources.[6]  [6]
In a letter dated June 13, 1968, J. van der Klooster, keeper of the Topographical Department, RKD, stated that a villa like the one in An Architectural Fantasy never existed in the Netherlands (in NGA curatorial files). See also letters in NGA curatorial files from Eric Forssman, director of the Kunstgeschichtliches Institut of the University of Freiburg (February 8, 1981); Wilhelm Diedenhofen (August 12, 1981); and Guido de Werd, director of the Municipal Museum of Cleves (August 8, 1981). Helga Wagner, Jan van der Heyden, 1637–1712 (Amsterdam, 1971), 39, suggests that the villa is based on an engraving or an architectural project for a French château. She entitles the painting “Französisches Gartenschlosschen.” The villa differs from seventeenth-century French châteaux in three important respects, however: the gentle pitch of the roof, the absence of dormers and chimneys, and the façade consisting of only three blocks. In contemporary French châteaux, the façade was usually more complex, consisting of five or more blocks, with the central pavilion complemented by projecting end pavilions. See plates in Louis Hautecoeur, Histoire d’architecture classique en France (Paris, 1948), 2: parts 1 and 2.

This assessment is supported by an analysis of the building’s architectural elements. The Palladian-style villa is striking for the apparent classicism of the building and the abundance of architectural and freestanding sculpture.[7]  [7]
I would like to thank Sally M. Wages for her research into the architectural character of this château, which has formed the basis for this entry. While many features of the building are consistent with Dutch classical architecture after mid-century,[8]  [8]
The façade reflects the new concept of a building as a symmetrical organization of blocks. Giant orders, statues at the roofline, urns of carved fruit, and panels with festoons were motifs widely adopted by Dutch builders. They were prominently displayed on the Amsterdam Town Hall. While deeply projecting central blocks were rare, they were used on the side façades of Amalia van Solm’s country residence, the Huis ten Bosch, and on the front façade of the Amsterdam Town Hall. See Helga Wagner, Jan van der Heyden, 1637–1712 (Amsterdam, 1971), nos. 133–138 for the Huis ten Bosch and nos. 1–4 for the Amsterdam Town Hall. Other architectural elements in the painting, while found in Italian treatises, were not common in Dutch buildings of the time. Steeply pitched roofs with dormer windows and chimneys were still standard in northern Europe. The gently pitched roof without dormers and chimneys here corresponds to Palladio’s designs suitable for a mild climate. The stringcourse that continues behind the pilasters was not adopted by Dutch builders, but is a frequent motif in façade elevations by Palladio and his compatriots. See Andrea Palladio, I Quattro Libri dell’ Architettura Universale (Milan, 1615; facsimile ed., 4 vols., Milan, 1968), 2:iii, 14; Sebastiano Serlio, I Sette Libri dell’ Architettura (Venice, 1584; facsimile ed., 2 vols., Bologna, 1978), 2: book 7:xlii–xliii, 103, 105; Vincenzo Scamozzi, L’Idea della Architettura Universale (1615; facsimile ed., 2 vols., Ridgewood, N.J., 1964), part 1, 2:viii, xiv, 126, 281. the extensive sculptural elements are not. These, particularly the sculptured panels on the basement level of the façade, derive from decorative architecture such as tombs, designs for triumphal arches, and, above all, fantastic architectural compositions in book frontispieces.[9]  [9]
For tombs, see Erwin Panofsky, Tomb Sculpture: Four Lectures on Its Changing Aspects from Ancient Egypt to Bernini, ed. H. W. Janson (New York, 1964), esp. fig. 331. For wall decorations see Douglas Lewis, The Drawings of Andrea Palladio (Washington, D.C., 1981), fig. 60. For triumphal arches see Joannes Boschius, Descriptio publicae gratulationis spectaculorum et ludorum, in adventu Sereniss. Principis Ernesti Archiducis Austriae (Antwerp, 1602), and Jean Gaspard Gevaerts, Pompa Introitus Honori … Serenissimi Prinicipis Ferdinandi Austriaci Hispaniarum Infantis (Antwerp, 1641; facsimile ed., London, 1972), pls. 15, 56, 90, 91. For frontispieces see J. Richard Judson and Carl van de Velde, Corpus Rubenianum Ludwig Burchard, Part XXI: Book Illustrations and Title Pages, 2 vols. (London, 1978), 2: pls. 26 and 55.

The combination of paired pilasters and a triangular pediment enclosing an arched opening, used on the villa’s façade and repeated in the gateway, may also have been drawn from decorative architecture. A similar combination of elements is seen in an engraving depicting one of the stages erected in Amsterdam in 1642 at the time of the visit of Queen Henrietta Maria of England.[10]  [10]
Reproduced in Dirck P. Snoep, Praal en Propaganda: Triumfalia in de Noordelijke Nederlanden in de 16de en 17de eeuw (Alphen aan den Rijn, 1975), fig. 34. Another unusual architectural component found in this building and in one of the arches for Queen Henrietta Maria’s visit to Amsterdam is the stringcourse that continues behind the pilasters. Dirck P. Snoep, Praal en Propaganda: Triumfalia in de Noordelijke Nederlanden in de 16de en 17de eeuw (Alphen aan den Rijn, 1975), figs. 38 and 40, reproduces the design of the stages in Samuel Coster’s Beschrijvinge (Amsterdam, 1642). This stage setting, with minor alterations, was used again in 1648 on the Dam, the city square, for the celebration of the Peace of Münster [fig. 2]   [fig. 2] Engraving of a stage erected in 1648 on the Dam in Amsterdam to celebrate the Treaty of Münster, Atlas Van Stolk, Rotterdam.[11]  [11]
Dirck P. Snoep, Praal en Propaganda: Triumfalia in de Noordelijke Nederlanden in de 16de en 17de eeuw (Alphen aan den Rijn, 1975), 78, figs. 42 and 43. The two side stages in fig. 42 incorporate the motif of crossed palms encircled by a wreath, a device that also ornaments the basement of the villa in An Architectural Fantasy. Finally, the concept for the gateway may well be derived from one of Serlio’s designs.[12]  [12]
Sebastiano Serlio, I Sette Libri dell’ Architettura (Venice, 1584; facsimile ed., 2 vols., Bologna, 1978), 2: book 6, fols. 4 recto, 7 recto, 19 recto, 20 verso, 26 verso. Serlio employs this combination of elements for the centerpiece of only one villa façade, book 7:xvii, 41, which is remarkably similar to that in An Architectural Fantasy.

Whatever the source, Van der Heyden sought to render the building and its surrounding features with such extraordinary precision that he took the innovative step of using a printmaking technique to evoke their different textures. For the brick walls, a reddish-brown color was applied on top of the ground, and then the outlines of the bricks seem to have been printed onto the underlying paint, carefully registered in order to ensure that the outlines would match up correctly. The grass sprouting at the edge of the trench in the foreground was printed with a softer material, perhaps with sponge or lichen. Pinholes can also be found at the center of the arched gate, the building entrance, and the central window, indicating the use of a compass to create precise arcs.[13]  [13]
See Technical Summary. Like most of Van der Heyden’s works, this painting is difficult to date precisely. The architectural character of the scene compares closely with his depictions of the Huis ten Bosch, one of which bears the date 1668.[14]  [14]
Helga Wagner, Jan van der Heyden, 1637–1712 (Amsterdam, 1971), nos. 133–139. Huis ten Bosch is a similarly classical building with a projecting central block situated in the midst of an elegant garden decorated with marble statues. The general compositional arrangement—a sunlit villa in the background, a gateway in the middle ground, and figures in the foreground—resembles Van der Heyden’s Harteveld on the Vecht from about 1670 [fig. 3]   [fig. 3] Jan van der Heyden, Harteveld on the Vecht, late 1660s, oil on canvas, Musée du Louvre, Paris. Photo © RMN / Art Resource, NY. Photographer: Hervé Lewandowski. Finally, the setting for Elswout could have been the source of Van der Heyden’s idea to site the house on elevated ground. The staffage figures have been traditionally, and probably rightly, attributed to Adriaen van de Velde (Dutch, 1636 - 1672), an artist with whom Van der Heyden frequently collaborated. It should be noted, however, that they do resemble figures Van der Heyden drew for his book on his invention of water pumps, Beschrijving der nieuwlijks uitgevonden en geoctrojeerde Slangbrandspuiten, published in 1690, eighteen years after Van de Velde’s death, so it is not inconceivable that they were painted by Van der Heyden himself.[15]  [15]
The earliest record of this painting, the 1816 Paris auction catalogue, states that the figures are by Adriaen van de Velde. Helga Wagner, Jan van der Heyden, 1637–1712 (Amsterdam, 1971), 101, accepts this attribution. The figures, in any event, were painted after the landscape was completed. This is particularly evident in the figures of the beggar woman and the man with his hounds as traces of the architecture have begun to show through their fading forms. Another interesting issue is whether the beggar woman and other staffage figures have thematic implications. Schama has proposed that the beggar woman near the archway provided commentary on the social responsibility of the rich to the poor.[16]  [16]
Simon Schama, The Embarrassment of Riches: An Interpretation of Dutch Culture in the Golden Age (New York, 1987), 573. The architectural fragments upon which is seated the man tending the dogs may allude to the mutability of earthly possessions.

Original entry by Arthur K. Wheelock Jr., April 24, 2014.

Revised by Alexandra Libby to incorporate information from a new technical examination.

December 9, 2019