Various landscapes. Plate 5. Group of four trees.

Besides the Swiss topographical drawings, Hackaert made several other drawings. These drawings are sketchier, broader and lighter in execution than his topographical work. He would sketch miners at work in the mountains and often had complaints laid against him from disturbed and disgruntled miners, who believed he was either a spy or casting spells on them. Hackaert’s forest landscapes with hunting scenes show more originality than his Italianate landscapes and were very popular on the contemporary art market. His latest signed work dates from 1685 in which year, or soon after, he is assumed to have died.

Hackaert’s paintings may be broadly divided into two categories: Italianate landscapes and woodland scenes. Te Papa currently has seven etchings by Hackaert in its collection. This print is Plate 5 from the series of six entitled Various landscapes (Hollstein) or simply Landscapes (British Museum Collection online catalogue). Te Papa owns a complete set, which was part of the collection of Old Master prints presented to the Colonial Museum by Bishop Ditlev Monrad in 1869. This etching depicts two men conversing in an idyllic landscape adjacent to a group of trees, as the title implies. To the right, four prominent and crooked trees stand between a road and the bank of river or pond. In the distance, breaking through a canopy of trees, is a building with a steeply pitched roof and a steeple, almost certainly a local church.